Factory Reset Protection bypass on Huawei smartphones

1) Permissions, Privileges, and Access Controls

EUVDB-ID: #VU18919

Risk: Low

CVSSv3.1: 4 [CVSS:3.1/AV:P/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N/E:U/RL:O/RC:C]

CVE-ID: CVE-2019-5220

CWE-ID: CWE-264 - Permissions, Privileges, and Access Controls

Exploit availability: No

Description

The vulnerability allows an attacker to escalate privileges on the system.

The vulnerability exists due to the system does not sufficiently verify the permission. An attacker with physical access to the smartphones can do a certain operation on certain step of setup wizard.

Successful exploitation of this vulnerability may allow an attacker to bypass the FRP protection.

Mitigation

Install updates from vendor's website.

Vulnerable software versions

Huawei Honor Magic 2: before Tony-AL00B/Tony-TL00B 9.0.0.182(C00E180R2P2)

Huawei Mate 20: before Hima-AL00B/Hima-TL00B 9.0.0.200(C00E200R2P1)

Huawei Mate 20 X : before Ever-AL00B 9.0.0.200(C00E200R2P1)

External links

http://www.huawei.com/en/psirt/security-advisories/huawei-sa-20190626-01-frp-en

Q & A

Can this vulnerability be exploited remotely?

No. The attacker should have physical access to the system in order to successfully exploit this vulnerability.

Is there known malware, which exploits this vulnerability?

No. We are not aware of malware exploiting this vulnerability.