June 2, 2025 By Pierluigi Paganini
Technical details about a critical Cisco IOS XE WLC flaw (CVE-2025-20188) are now public, raising the risk of a working exploit emerging soon.
Details of a critical vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2025-20188, impacting Cisco IOS XE WLC are now public, raising the risk of exploitation.
In early May, Cisco released software updates to address the vulnerability CVE-2025-20188 (CVSS score 10). An unauthenticated, remote attacker can exploit the flaw to load arbitrary files to a vulnerable system.
An attacker can exploit this flaw by sending crafted HTTPS requests to the AP image download interface, potentially gaining root access and executing arbitrary commands.
“A vulnerability in the Out-of-Band Access Point (AP) Image Download feature of Cisco IOS XE Software for Wireless LAN Controllers (WLCs) could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to upload arbitrary files to an affected system.” reads the advisory. “This vulnerability is due to the presence of a hard-coded JSON Web Token (JWT) on an affected system. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending crafted HTTPS requests to the AP image download interface. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to upload files, perform path traversal, and execute arbitrary commands with root privileges.”
The flaw can be exploited only if the Out-of-Band AP Image Download feature is enabled, however the IT giant pointed out that the flaw is disabled by default.
The vulnerability impacts the following products:
- Catalyst 9800-CL Wireless Controllers for Cloud
- Catalyst 9800 Embedded Wireless Controller for Catalyst 9300, 9400, and 9500 Series Switches
- Catalyst 9800 Series Wireless Controllers
- Embedded Wireless Controller on Catalyst APs
