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The vCenter ESX Agent Manager service must configure the "setCharacterEncodingFilter" filter.


Overview

Finding ID Version Rule ID IA Controls Severity
V-259020 VCEM-80-000127 SV-259020r961158_rule Medium
Description
Invalid user input occurs when a user inserts data or characters into a hosted application's data entry field and the hosted application is unprepared to process that data. This results in unanticipated application behavior, potentially leading to an application compromise. Invalid user input is one of the primary methods employed when attempting to compromise an application. An attacker can also enter Unicode characters into hosted applications in an effort to break out of the document home or root home directory or to bypass security checks. VMware uses the standard Tomcat "SetCharacterEncodingFilter" to provide a layer of defense against character encoding attacks. Filters are Java objects that perform filtering tasks on the request to a resource (a servlet or static content), on the response from a resource, or both.
STIG Date
VMware vSphere 8.0 vCenter Appliance ESX Agent Manager (EAM) Security Technical Implementation Guide 2024-07-11

Details

Check Text ( C-62760r934716_chk )
At the command prompt, run the following command:

# xmllint --xpath "//*[contains(text(), 'setCharacterEncodingFilter')]/parent::*" /usr/lib/vmware-eam/web/webapps/eam/WEB-INF/web.xml

Expected result:


setCharacterEncodingFilter
/*


setCharacterEncodingFilter
org.apache.catalina.filters.SetCharacterEncodingFilter
true

encoding
UTF-8


ignore
true



If the output is does not match the expected result, this is a finding.
Fix Text (F-62669r934717_fix)
Navigate to and open:

/usr/lib/vmware-eam/web/webapps/eam/WEB-INF/web.xml

Configure the node with the child nodes listed below:


setCharacterEncodingFilter
/*



setCharacterEncodingFilter
org.apache.catalina.filters.SetCharacterEncodingFilter
true

encoding
UTF-8


ignore
true



Restart the service with the following command:

# vmon-cli --restart eam