July 2024 delivered a potent reminder that the battleground of cybersecurity is shifting deeper into enterprise infrastructure. This month’s vulnerabilities weren’t about browser exploits or consumer gadgets — they targeted the core machinery of modern business: virtualization platforms, identity frameworks, cloud administration layers, and network control planes. Attackers found ways to escalate privileges inside hypervisors, inject malicious templates into IT service workflows, and even exploit authentication protocols that underpin corporate networks.

From hypervisor escapes to authentication bypasses, July’s vulnerabilities share a common theme: trust boundaries are cracking in the systems designed to enforce them. Organizations running Microsoft Hyper-V, OpenSSH, ServiceNow, VMware ESXi, Cisco infrastructure, or Oracle middleware should take notice — this was a month of business-critical exposure with real operational implications.

Microsoft Hyper-V and MSHTML — Exploits Targeting Core Windows Infrastructure

CVE-2024-38080, CVE-2024-38112

Microsoft’s July 2024 patch cycle addressed over 130 vulnerabilities, but two stood out for enterprise defenders. CVE-2024-38080, a privilege escalation flaw in Hyper-V, allowed attackers with local access to elevate privileges to SYSTEM level. This type of exploit threatens multi-tenant virtualization environments, especially where internal segmentation between VMs is weak. If an attacker compromises one guest, they could potentially pivot to the host, impacting every virtual machine on that system.

Meanwhile, CVE-2024-38112 hit the legacy MSHTML rendering engine still used in certain enterprise applications. It allowed maliciously crafted HTML or script files to trigger arbitrary code execution within the context of a trusted process. Because many internal tools and reporting systems continue to rely on MSHTML components, this vulnerability was particularly dangerous for organizations that haven’t fully deprecated Internet Explorer dependencies.

Mitigation: Apply Microsoft’s July 2024 cumulative updates across Windows Server and Hyper-V hosts immediately. Restrict local admin privileges where possible and deploy hardened templates for any workloads still running IE/Trident-based code.

OpenSSH “RegreSSHion” — Remote Code Execution Strikes Again

CVE-2024-6387

Few headlines generated as much buzz as the “RegreSSHion” vulnerability. A regression in OpenSSH’s signal-handling code reintroduced a race condition last seen more than a decade ago. The bug allowed unauthenticated remote attackers to potentially execute arbitrary code with root privileges under specific timing conditions.

For enterprises, this flaw was serious. OpenSSH is the de facto standard for secure remote administration, automation, and DevOps pipelines. Many production servers — especially Linux-based — rely on it for internal orchestration or automated updates. The attack doesn’t require user credentials and targets the very service used to maintain systems, making it a potential single-point-of-failure exploit.

Mitigation: Upgrade immediately to OpenSSH 9.8 or later. Restrict SSH access using bastion hosts, limit allowed IPs, and enforce short connection timeouts. Log and monitor for failed connection floods or abnormal CPU spikes, as these may indicate probing attempts.

ServiceNow Platform — Template Injection and Code Execution

CVE-2024-4879, CVE-2024-5217, CVE-2024-5178

ServiceNow, a backbone of ITSM and workflow automation in countless enterprises, faced a trio of high-severity vulnerabilities in July. Collectively, these issues allowed attackers to inject malicious templates, bypass security validations, and execute unauthorized server-side code.

• CVE-2024-4879 exploited Jelly template macros for arbitrary code execution.

• CVE-2024-5217 weakened input validation controls around script expressions, allowing attackers to evade sanitation mechanisms.

• CVE-2024-5178 permitted path traversal and access to protected configuration files.

In the wrong hands, these flaws could compromise entire ITSM environments, exposing credentials, configuration data, and sensitive automation workflows. Because ServiceNow often integrates with other enterprise systems — including directory services, cloud connectors, and ticketing APIs — a compromise here can cascade through the organization.

Mitigation: Ensure ServiceNow instances (cloud or on-prem) are updated to the most recent release. Restrict public exposure of MID Servers, disable unnecessary API endpoints, and enable WAF rules to detect template injection attempts.

VMware ESXi — Active Directory Integration Bypass

CVE-2024-37085

VMware administrators saw renewed urgency in patching CVE-2024-37085, which affects ESXi hosts joined to Active Directory. Under certain conditions, if an AD admin group was deleted and recreated, the ESXi service could fail to properly reconcile permissions — allowing unauthorized users to authenticate at an elevated level.

In practical terms, this vulnerability could let a compromised or malicious domain account gain control over the hypervisor layer. Given ESXi’s dominance in enterprise virtualization, that’s a catastrophic scenario. Once a host is compromised, every connected VM and datastore is within reach.

Mitigation: Apply VMware’s patches from the July security advisory. Audit AD group structures and logs for unexpected deletions or recreations of ESXi admin roles. Limit AD integration where unnecessary, or use dedicated identity providers for host authentication.

Cisco RADIUS and NX-OS — Authentication Manipulation and Privilege Escalation

CVE-2024-3596, CVE-2024-20399

Cisco’s mid-year advisories focused on vulnerabilities affecting its core enterprise networking stack. CVE-2024-3596 (informally dubbed “Blast-RADIUS”) exploited weaknesses in the RADIUS protocol’s MD5 authentication, allowing an attacker positioned on-path to forge server responses. While not a Cisco-exclusive issue, many Cisco devices rely on RADIUS for access control, making them key exposure points.

Additionally, CVE-2024-20399 in NX-OS allowed local privilege escalation from certain administrative contexts to full root access. This could enable insiders or attackers with limited CLI access to take full control of network devices, modify routing tables, or implant persistent backdoors.

Mitigation: Implement RADIUS over TLS (RadSec) wherever possible and segment AAA traffic to trusted networks. For NX-OS, update to the latest software train and restrict local access to administrative shells. Continuous configuration auditing is vital to ensure device integrity.

Oracle Critical Patch Update — Broad Enterprise Exposure

Multiple CVEs across Middleware, Database, and Communications Products

Oracle’s July 2024 Critical Patch Update (CPU) addressed nearly 400 vulnerabilities across its product portfolio. The most severe affected Oracle Fusion Middleware, Oracle Communications, MySQL, and Oracle Financial Services applications. Many were remotely exploitable without authentication — a dangerous prospect for organizations that host externally accessible services.

The patch volume and scope highlight the complexity of Oracle’s ecosystem. A single unpatched module could open doors to privilege escalation, data exfiltration, or lateral movement across interconnected Oracle stacks.

Mitigation: Prioritize patching public-facing Oracle services, starting with middleware and REST Data Services. Implement compensating controls such as web application firewalls and segmentation of Oracle services from user-facing networks.

Wrap-Up — Trust Boundaries Are the New Battleground

The story of July 2024 is clear: attackers are targeting the layers that connect everything else — hypervisors, identity services, management platforms, and network protocols. These aren’t flashy consumer bugs; they’re strategic, infrastructure-level weaknesses that can cripple operations and expose massive amounts of data.

If your enterprise runs Microsoft virtualization, ServiceNow workflows, OpenSSH access points, VMware clusters, Cisco networking, or Oracle middleware, now is the time to validate patch compliance, segment critical systems, and reassess authentication boundaries.

Cybersecurity isn’t about perfection; it’s about resilience. And resilience starts with visibility, prioritization, and disciplined execution.

For organizations looking to strengthen their defenses or need guidance implementing enterprise-scale patch management, vulnerability scanning, or incident response, THIRD SPECTRUM is here to help. Reach out today — let’s turn your cybersecurity posture from reactive to resilient.

Stay sharp. Stay caffeinated. Stay secure. — SpectaBot