Cybersecurity researchers have disclosed 46 new safety flaws in merchandise from three photo voltaic inverter distributors, Sungrow, Growatt, and SMA, that could possibly be exploited by a foul actor to grab management of units or execute code remotely, posing extreme dangers to electrical grids.
The vulnerabilities have been collectively codenamed SUN:DOWN by Forescout Vedere Labs.
“The brand new vulnerabilities will be exploited to execute arbitrary instructions on units or the seller’s cloud, take over accounts, acquire a foothold within the vendor’s infrastructure, or take management of inverter homeowners’ units,” the corporate said in a report shared with The Hacker Information.
Among the notable flaws recognized are listed beneath –
- Attackers can add .aspx information that can be executed by the online server of SMA (sunnyportal[.]com), leading to distant code execution
- Unauthenticated attackers can carry out username enumeration by way of the uncovered “server.growatt.com/userCenter.do” endpoint
- Unauthenticated attackers can get hold of the listing of crops belonging to different customers in addition to arbitrary units by way of the “server-api.growatt.com/newTwoEicAPI.do” endpoint, leading to system takeover
- Unauthenticated attackers can get hold of the serial variety of a wise meter utilizing a legitimate username by way of the “server-api.growatt.com/newPlantAPI.do” endpoint, leading to account takeover
- Unauthenticated attackers can get hold of details about EV chargers, vitality consumption data, and different delicate information by way of the “evcharge.growatt.com/ocpp” endpoint, in addition to remotely configure EV chargers and acquire data associated to firmware, leading to data disclosure and bodily injury
- The Android application related to Sungrow makes use of an insecure AES key to encrypt shopper information, opening the door to a state of affairs the place an attacker can intercept and decrypt communications between the cellular app and iSolarCloud
- The Android application related to Sungrow explicitly ignores certificates errors and is weak to adversary-in-the-middle (AitM) assaults
- Sungrow’s WiNet WebUI comprises a hard-coded password that can be utilized to decrypt all firmware updates
- A number of vulnerabilities in Sungrow when dealing with MQTT messages that might lead to distant code execution or a denial-of-service (DoS) situation
“An attacker that gained management of a giant fleet of Sungrow, Growatt, and SMA inverters utilizing the newly found vulnerabilities might management sufficient energy to trigger instability to those energy grids and different main ones,” Forescout stated.
In a hypothetical assault state of affairs focusing on Growatt inverters, a menace actor might guess the actual account usernames by means of an uncovered API, hijack the accounts by resetting their passwords to the default “123456,” and carry out follow-on exploitation.
To make issues worse, the hijacked fleet of inverters might then be managed as a botnet to amplify the assault and inflict injury on the grid, resulting in grid disruption and potential blackouts. All of the distributors have since addressed the identified issues following accountable disclosure.
“As attackers can management complete fleets of units with an impression on vitality manufacturing, they’ll alter their settings to ship kind of vitality to the grid at sure occasions,” Forescout stated, including the newly found flaws danger exposing the grid to cyber-physical ransomware assaults.
Daniel dos Santos, Head of Analysis at Forescout Vedere Labs, stated mitigating the dangers requires imposing strict safety necessities when procuring photo voltaic tools, conducting common danger assessments, and making certain full community visibility into these units.
The disclosure comes as severe safety flaws have been found in manufacturing line monitoring cameras made by Japanese firm Inaba Denki Sangyo that could possibly be exploited for distant surveillance and forestall recording manufacturing stoppages.
The vulnerabilities stay unpatched, however the vendor has urged customers to limit web entry and restrict make sure that such units are put in in a safe, restricted space that is accessible solely to approved personnel.
“These flaws allow numerous assaults, permitting an unauthenticated attacker to remotely and secretly entry stay footage for surveillance, or disrupt the recording of manufacturing line stoppages stopping the seize of important moments,” Nozomi Networks said.
In latest months, the operational know-how (OT) safety firm has additionally detailed a number of safety defects within the GE Vernova N60 Network Relay, Zettler 130.8005 industrial gateway, and Wago 750-8216/025-001 programmable logic controller (PLC) that could possibly be weaponized by an attacker to take full management of the units.
