SonicWall SMA1000 Vulnerability Allow Attackers to Exploit Encoded URLs To Remotely Gain Internal Systems Access

SonicWall has issued a critical security advisory (SNWLID-2025-0010) for its SMA1000 Appliance Work Place interface, revealing a high-severity Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF) vulnerability.

The flaw, identified as CVE-2025-40595 with a CVSS v3 score of 7.2, enables unauthenticated attackers to exploit encoded URLs to send unauthorized requests to unintended destinations, potentially compromising internal networks and sensitive data.

Security researcher Ronan Kervella of Bishopfox discovered this vulnerability, which affects all SMA1000 devices running firmware version 12.4.3-02925 (platform-hotfix) or earlier.

The Server-Side Request Forgery vulnerability in SonicWall’s SMA1000 appliances presents significant security implications due to its technical characteristics.

According to SonicWall’s Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT), the flaw specifically impacts the Work Place interface component, allowing malicious actors to manipulate the appliance into making requests to unintended locations.

The vulnerability’s CVSS vector indicates several concerning attributes: it can be exploited over network connections (AV:N), requires low attack complexity (AC:L), needs no privileges (PR:N), and demands no user interaction (UI:N).

This combination makes the vulnerability particularly dangerous as it provides attackers with a straightforward exploitation path requiring minimal effort and no authentication credentials.

The technical mechanism of this vulnerability involves attackers sending specially crafted HTTP requests containing encoded URLs to the Work Place interface.

When processed by the vulnerable system, these requests cause the SMA1000 appliance to initiate connections to either internal resources or external systems that would typically be inaccessible.

This capability effectively breaks the security boundary between the internet-facing application and protected internal resources, creating a pivotal entry point for further network infiltration and lateral movement within targeted organizations.

Attack Vector and Potential Exploitation

The exploitation of this vulnerability follows a classic SSRF attack pattern but with specific nuances related to the SMA1000 implementation.

Remote attackers can craft HTTP requests with encoded URL parameters that bypass validation mechanisms within the Work Place interface.

Once these malicious requests are processed, the appliance itself becomes the vehicle for subsequent network requests, essentially “forwarding” the attack with its own system privileges and access rights.

Since the SMA1000 appliance is designed to provide secure remote access, it typically holds trusted positions within network architectures and security frameworks.

This position of trust makes the exploitation particularly effective, as requests originating from the compromised appliance may be permitted through internal security controls that would otherwise block external traffic.

Potential attack scenarios include reconnaissance of internal network architecture, access to restricted internal services, or even data exfiltration by tunneling requests through the compromised appliance.

In sophisticated attack chains, this vulnerability could serve as the initial foothold, allowing attackers to map internal systems before deploying additional exploits against discovered services and resources.

SonicWall has released hotfix version 12.4.3-02963 (platform-hotfix) and higher to comprehensively address this vulnerability.

The security update specifically modifies how the Work Place interface processes URL requests, implementing proper validation and preventing the redirection of requests to unintended destinations.

SonicWall’s PSIRT emphasizes that no workarounds exist for this vulnerability, making immediate patching the only viable security measure against potential exploitation.

Organizations utilizing SMA1000 appliances must immediately verify their firmware version through the device management interface and apply the security update available through the MySonicWall portal.

Network administrators should prioritize this remediation based on the criticality of affected systems and their exposure to untrusted networks.

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