Researchers Flag Serious Authentication Bypass Vulnerability After Pega Infinity Hotfix Released

After security researchers discovered a flaw in the Pega Infinity enterprise software platform, users are being advised to upgrade their installations. 

CVE-2021-27651 is a critical-risk vulnerability in Pega’s Infinity program versions 8.2.1 to 8.5.2, according to the research team of Sam Curry, Justin Rhinehart, Brett Buerhaus, and Maik Robert. 

The proof-of-concept shows how an intruder can circumvent Pega Infinity’s password reset system. Via administrator-only remote code execution, assailants could then use the reset account to “fully compromise” the Pega case. It includes modifying complex pages or templating. The researchers collaborated with the developer Pegasystems, to construct a hot patch. According to the vendor, customers running the program on-premises should check if their version is affected and apply the relevant hot patch. 

With over 2,000 users, Pega Infinity is a common enterprise software suite. Customer service and sales automation, an AI-driven ‘customer decision hub,’ workforce intelligence, and a ‘no-code’ development platform are all included in the kit. The Pega Infinity vulnerability was discovered as a result of the security researchers’ involvement in Apple’s bug bounty program. 

“We’d been hacking on Apple’s bug bounty program for about six months and had spent a lot of time on software produced by Apple themselves,” UK-based hacker Sam Curry told The Daily Swig. 

“After reading a blog post from two amazing researchers, we agreed to take a different approach and target vendors [supplying technology to Apple].”Curry has written about his experiences with Apple’s bug bounty program in the past. 

Burp Suite was used by the researchers to find the password reset flaw in Pega Infinity. According to Curry, this allows for a complete compromise of any Pega instance with “no prerequisite information.” Justin Rhinehart also developed a Nuclei template for determining whether or not the software is running Pega Infinity. 

“Pega’s customers are from every sector and at the time of reporting some of the customers included the FBI, US Air Force, Apple, American Express, and a few other huge names.” 

Curry states that Pega was able to collaborate with the researchers to patch the flaw, although they needed time for customers using Infinity on-premises to upgrade their installations. Curry mentioned that the procedure took more than three months.