Overview
A critical argument injection vulnerability has been disclosed in Infoblox NIOS, the operating system powering Infoblox's DNS, DHCP, and IP address management (DDI) appliances widely used in enterprise and service-provider networks. Tracked as CVE-2026-107510 with a CVSS score of 9.1, the flaw lets an already-authenticated, high-privilege user inject additional arguments into the NIOS command-line interface's troubleshooting commands, resulting in privilege escalation beyond what their assigned role should permit.
Unlike many of the unauthenticated, zero-click flaws covered on Labs, this one requires an attacker to already hold elevated NIOS credentials — but the escalation path it opens can hand that attacker effective administrative control over core DNS/DHCP infrastructure.
Technical Details
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| CVE ID | CVE-2026-107510 |
| Severity | Critical (CVSS 9.1) |
| Attack Vector | Network |
| Attack Complexity | Low |
| Authentication | Required — high privilege |
| User Interaction | None |
| Scope | Changed |
| Impact | High confidentiality, integrity, and availability impact |
| Affected Versions | NIOS 9.0.x through 9.1.0 |
| Assigned By | Infoblox |
| Disclosed | 2026-10-08 |
How It Works
NIOS exposes a restricted command-line interface for administrative troubleshooting tasks — diagnostics, connectivity checks, and similar operational commands. The CLI does not properly validate or sanitize the arguments a high-privilege user supplies to these troubleshooting commands before they are processed.
An authenticated user who already holds elevated (but not full administrative) privileges can craft additional, unintended arguments and inject them into the underlying command execution path. Because the scope of the vulnerability is "Changed" — meaning the impact extends beyond the vulnerable component itself — successful exploitation lets the attacker's injected arguments affect parts of the system their role was never meant to reach, escalating to broader administrative control over the appliance.
Impact Assessment
Who Is At Risk
Any organization running Infoblox NIOS 9.0.x through 9.1.0 that grants high-privilege (but sub-administrator) CLI access to multiple operators — common in managed-service and large enterprise environments where DNS/DHCP operations are delegated to a tier of trusted-but-not-fully-trusted staff.
Potential Attack Chains
- Privileged Access — Attacker already holds, or compromises, a high-privilege NIOS account (e.g. via phished credentials or an insider threat)
- Argument Injection — Attacker crafts a troubleshooting command with injected arguments beyond what the command is meant to accept
- Privilege Escalation — The injected arguments execute with elevated effect, granting the attacker capabilities outside their assigned role
- Infrastructure-Wide Impact — Given NIOS underpins DNS/DHCP for the network, an escalated attacker can manipulate name resolution, address assignment, or appliance configuration at scale
Mitigation
Immediate Actions
- Check your NIOS version — any appliance running 9.0.x through 9.1.0 should be treated as affected until a fixed build is confirmed installed
- Monitor Infoblox's official security advisories at support.infoblox.com for a patched release; fix availability had not yet been published at time of writing
- Review accounts with high-privilege CLI access and reduce the roster to only those who strictly require it
Detection Opportunities
- Audit NIOS command-line logs for troubleshooting commands with anomalous or unexpected argument patterns
- Flag privilege or role changes on NIOS accounts that don't correspond to a change-management ticket
- Monitor for configuration drift on DNS/DHCP settings following CLI sessions from high-privilege accounts
Defence-in-Depth
- Apply the principle of least privilege to NIOS CLI role assignments; avoid granting "high privilege" access as a default tier
- Restrict NIOS management-plane access to dedicated, access-controlled management networks
- Enable multi-factor authentication and session logging for all privileged NIOS accounts
Discovery & Disclosure
CVE-2026-107510 was reserved and published on 2026-10-08, assigned directly by Infoblox. As of publication, it is not listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog, and no public proof-of-concept exploit is known to exist. Because exploitation requires existing high-privilege access, organizations should prioritize this alongside routine credential and access-review hygiene rather than treating it as an immediate perimeter emergency — but should still track Infoblox's advisory for patch availability.