CVE-2004-1858

Vulnerability

HP Web Jetadmin version 7.5.2546, a web-based management tool for HP printers, contains a denial of service vulnerability. A remote attacker can send a malformed HTTP request that includes an invalid use of the "$" character, triggering a stricmp() error that crashes the server [1]. The service runs on a modified Apache HTTP server and is typically accessible on port 8443.

Exploitation

An attacker does not require authentication or any special privileges. The only requirement is network access to the HP Web Jetadmin HTTP server. By crafting a request with a malformed "$" character in the URL or parameters, the attacker can cause the server to crash immediately [1]. No user interaction is needed.

Impact

Successful exploitation results in a denial of service, rendering the HP Web Jetadmin service unavailable. Since the service runs with SYSTEM-level privileges, a crash may affect other services on the same system. However, the impact is limited to availability; no data compromise or code execution is achieved through this specific vulnerability.

Mitigation

HP was notified and planned to release an update in Spring 2004 [1]. As of the publication date (2004-12-31), the fix should be available. Administrators are advised to upgrade to a patched version. If no patch is applied, setting a password for the HP Web Jetadmin interface may reduce exposure, but the DoS vulnerability can still be triggered by any network user. No workaround is explicitly provided for this specific DoS issue.