CVE-2023-50224TP-Link TL-WR841N Authentication Bypass by Spoofing Vulnerability
CVE-2023-50224 is a authentication bypass by spoofing in TP-Link TL-WR841N, rated medium (6.5 on CVSS 3.1).
Why this priority: Exploited in the wild: listed in CISA's KEV catalog.
Published · Updated · NVD status: Analyzed
What it is
Identity is trusted from something an attacker can fake, such as an address or header.
How it is reached
An attacker can exploit it from the same local network segment, without an account, and nobody has to click anything.
What an attacker gains
A successful attack can read the data it protects. In practice, this kind of flaw lets an attacker act as a signed-in user, or an administrator, without valid credentials.
Is it being exploited?
CISA added it to the Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog on 2025-09-03: it is being exploited in the wild. EPSS estimates a 20% chance of exploitation activity in the next 30 days, higher than 97% of scored CVEs.
What to do
- Treat it as urgent: it is on CISA's KEV list. CISA's deadline for US federal agencies: 2025-09-24.
- Apply the update for your edition of TP-Link TL-WR841N. Fixed builds: TL-WR841N: V11_211209, V12_230317; tl-wr841n_firmware: 12.0. Other affected products have their own fixed versions on this page.
- Segment the networks that can reach it.
- Check exposed instances for signs of compromise, not only for the version.
Description from NVD
TP-Link TL-WR841N dropbearpwd Improper Authentication Information Disclosure Vulnerability. This vulnerability allows network-adjacent attackers to disclose sensitive information on affected installations of TP-Link TL-WR841N routers. Authentication is not required to exploit this vulnerability. The specific flaw exists within the httpd service, which listens on TCP port 80 by default. The issue results from improper authentication. An attacker can leverage this vulnerability to disclose stored credentials, leading to further compromise. Was ZDI-CAN-19899.
What this means for your architecture.
A CVE names a product. Whether it matters depends on where that product sits in your systems: what reaches it, which trust boundary it guards and what it can reach once compromised. Veriom maps your components, their relationships and your trust boundaries from your code, cloud and delivery evidence, so you can see where a component like this sits. The radar itself does not look at your systems.
Components it touches
- Network edge devices: VPNs, firewalls, routers and gateways. They sit between the internet and internal networks, so a flaw in one is often the first step into everything behind it.
- Operating systems on servers, workstations or devices. Everything on the host inherits the flaw.
- Sign-in, session and token handling. The flaw sits between anonymous callers and authenticated sessions.
- Identity providers and SSO. The flaw sits between anonymous callers and authenticated sessions.
Trust boundaries in play
- Local network segment. The attacker must share a network segment with the target.
- Between anonymous callers and authenticated sessions. An attacker who crosses it can act as a signed-in user, or an administrator, without valid credentials.
Questions to answer about your own systems
- Where does TP-Link TL-WR841N run in your systems, and at which version?
- Which network segments can reach them?
- What can it reach once compromised: which data stores, secrets and services?
Sources
- CVE records and CVSS scores from the NVD CVE API. This product uses the NVD API but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD.
- Exploitation status from CISA’s Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog.
- Exploit likelihood from FIRST’s Exploit Prediction Scoring System (EPSS), refreshed daily.
- Explanations are written by Veriom from fixed templates over each record’s data, not by a person reviewing each CVE. Descriptions are quoted from the records as published.