📄 Description (English)
Atlassian Crowd and Crowd Data Center Remote Code Execution Vulnerability — Atlassian Crowd and Crowd Data Center contain a remote code execution vulnerability resulting from a pdkinstall development plugin being incorrectly enabled in release builds.
🤖 AI Executive Summary
CVE-2019-11580 is a critical remote code execution vulnerability in Atlassian Crowd and Crowd Data Center, scoring 9.0 on the CVSS scale. The vulnerability stems from the pdkinstall development plugin being incorrectly left enabled in production release builds, allowing unauthenticated attackers to upload and execute arbitrary plugins on the server. Public exploits are available, making this an actively exploitable threat requiring immediate attention. Organizations using Atlassian Crowd for centralized identity and access management are at severe risk of complete system compromise.
📄 Description (Arabic)
🤖 AI Intelligence Analysis Analyzed: Apr 13, 2026 12:37
🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia Impact Assessment
This vulnerability poses a severe risk to Saudi organizations across multiple critical sectors. Government entities and ministries using Atlassian Crowd for centralized SSO and identity management face complete authentication infrastructure compromise, directly violating NCA ECC mandates. Banking and financial institutions regulated by SAMA that rely on Crowd for employee access management risk unauthorized access to core banking systems and sensitive financial data. Energy sector organizations including ARAMCO and SABIC using Crowd in DevOps pipelines face potential lateral movement into operational technology environments. Telecom providers such as STC and Mobily using Crowd for internal IAM could see mass credential harvesting. Given that Atlassian products are widely deployed across Saudi Vision 2030 digital transformation projects, the blast radius of exploitation is exceptionally high. The availability of public exploits significantly elevates the likelihood of opportunistic attacks targeting Saudi infrastructure.
🏢 Affected Saudi Sectors
Government
Banking
Energy
Telecom
Healthcare
Technology
Defense
⚖️ Saudi Risk Score (AI)
9.2
/ 10.0
🔧 Remediation Steps (English)
IMMEDIATE ACTIONS (within 24 hours):
1. Identify all instances of Atlassian Crowd and Crowd Data Center in your environment using asset inventory tools.
2. Isolate exposed Crowd instances from public internet access immediately using firewall rules or WAF policies.
3. Check server logs for suspicious plugin upload attempts targeting /crowd/admin/uploadplugin.action endpoint.
4. Audit currently installed plugins for any unauthorized or unknown entries.
PATCHING GUIDANCE:
1. Upgrade to Atlassian Crowd versions 3.0.5, 3.1.6, 3.2.8, 3.3.5, or 3.4.4 and later — all contain the fix.
2. Follow Atlassian's official advisory at https://confluence.atlassian.com/crowd/crowd-security-advisory-2019-05-22-970260700.html
3. Verify the pdkinstall plugin is disabled post-upgrade by checking the plugin management console.
COMPENSATING CONTROLS (if patching is delayed):
1. Block external access to /crowd/admin/* endpoints via WAF or reverse proxy ACLs.
2. Restrict Crowd admin console access to trusted IP ranges only.
3. Implement network segmentation to isolate Crowd servers from sensitive internal systems.
4. Enable enhanced logging and SIEM alerting for all Crowd admin actions.
DETECTION RULES:
1. SIEM Alert: Monitor HTTP POST requests to /crowd/admin/uploadplugin.action from unauthorized sources.
2. IDS Signature: Detect multipart file uploads to Crowd admin endpoints.
3. EDR: Monitor for new JAR file creation in Crowd plugin directories followed by process execution.
4. Log Review: Search for 'pdkinstall' or 'uploadplugin' in Crowd access logs for historical compromise indicators.
🔧 خطوات المعالجة (العربية)
الإجراءات الفورية (خلال 24 ساعة):
1. تحديد جميع نسخ Atlassian Crowd وCrowd Data Center في البيئة باستخدام أدوات جرد الأصول.
2. عزل نسخ Crowd المكشوفة عن الإنترنت العام فوراً باستخدام قواعد جدار الحماية أو سياسات WAF.
3. فحص سجلات الخادم بحثاً عن محاولات رفع إضافات مشبوهة تستهدف المسار /crowd/admin/uploadplugin.action.
4. مراجعة الإضافات المثبتة حالياً للكشف عن أي إدخالات غير مصرح بها أو مجهولة.
إرشادات التصحيح:
1. الترقية إلى إصدارات Atlassian Crowd 3.0.5 أو 3.1.6 أو 3.2.8 أو 3.3.5 أو 3.4.4 وما بعدها — جميعها تحتوي على الإصلاح.
2. اتباع التوجيه الرسمي من Atlassian المتاح على موقعهم الرسمي.
3. التحقق من تعطيل مكوّن pdkinstall بعد الترقية من خلال وحدة تحكم إدارة الإضافات.
ضوابط التعويض (في حال تأخر التصحيح):
1. حظر الوصول الخارجي إلى مسارات /crowd/admin/* عبر WAF أو قوائم التحكم بالوصول للوكيل العكسي.
2. تقييد الوصول إلى وحدة تحكم Crowd على نطاقات IP موثوقة فقط.
3. تطبيق تجزئة الشبكة لعزل خوادم Crowd عن الأنظمة الداخلية الحساسة.
4. تفعيل التسجيل المعزز وتنبيهات SIEM لجميع إجراءات مسؤول Crowd.
قواعد الكشف:
1. تنبيه SIEM: مراقبة طلبات HTTP POST إلى /crowd/admin/uploadplugin.action من مصادر غير مصرح بها.
2. توقيع IDS: الكشف عن رفع ملفات متعددة الأجزاء إلى نقاط نهاية مسؤول Crowd.
3. EDR: مراقبة إنشاء ملفات JAR جديدة في مجلدات إضافات Crowd يعقبها تنفيذ عمليات.
4. مراجعة السجلات: البحث عن 'pdkinstall' أو 'uploadplugin' في سجلات وصول Crowd للكشف عن مؤشرات اختراق تاريخية.
📋 Regulatory Compliance Mapping
🟢 NCA ECC 2024
ECC-1-4-2: Cybersecurity Vulnerability Management
ECC-1-3-2: Cybersecurity Patch Management
ECC-2-3-1: Access Control and Identity Management
ECC-2-5-1: Application Security Requirements
ECC-1-5-1: Cybersecurity Incident Management
🔵 SAMA CSF
3.3.6: Vulnerability Management
3.3.7: Patch Management
3.4.2: Access Control Management
3.4.5: Application Security
3.3.9: Penetration Testing and Red Teaming
🟡 ISO 27001:2022
A.12.6.1: Management of Technical Vulnerabilities
A.14.2.2: System Change Control Procedures
A.9.4.2: Secure Log-on Procedures
A.14.1.2: Securing Application Services on Public Networks
A.16.1.1: Responsibilities and Procedures for Incident Management
🟣 PCI DSS v4.0
Requirement 6.3.3: All system components are protected from known vulnerabilities by installing applicable security patches
Requirement 6.2.4: Software engineering techniques to prevent or mitigate common software attacks
Requirement 7.2: Access control systems are in place
Requirement 11.3.1: Internal vulnerability scans are performed
🔗 References & Sources 0
No references.
📦 Affected Products / CPE 1 entries
Atlassian:Crowd and Crowd Data Center