ABB System 800xA, Symphony Plus IEC 61850

Risk Summary

This vulnerability was privately reported relating to ABB’s implementation of the IEC 61850 communication stack for MMS client applications used in some Automation control system products. Note: IEC 61850 communication typically supports MMS and GOOSE protocols. Some ABB products support both, others only MMS (e.g. S+ Operations and PM 877). In any case, GOOSE communication is not impacted by this reported vulnerability. If an attacker gains access to a site’s IEC 61850 network, then exploiting this vulnerability will result in a device fault (PM 877, CI850 and CI868 modules) and will require a manual restart. If this attack is directed at a S+ Operations node running IEC 61850 connectivity, this will result in a crash in the IEC 61850 communication driver which, if continued a repeating basis, will also result in a denial-of-service situation. Note that this does not have an impact on the overall availability and functionality of the S+ Operations node, only the IEC 61850 communication function. The System 800xA IEC61850 Connect is not affected.

CVEs (1)

Remediations

• ABB advises all customers to review their installations to determine if they are using an impacted product as listed above, no further analysis or tools are needed to make this determination. The recommended immediate actions per product are listed below: - CI868 (for AC 800M) Devices with firmware versions reported in Affected products are vulnerable. All the vulnerabilities will be corrected in 6.1.1 and 7.0 tracks for 800xA. AC 800M 6.1.1-3 is planned for Q2 2027, AC 800M 7.0 has been released in December 2025. - CI850 (for Symphony Plus SD Series) Devices with firmware versions reported in Affected products are vulnerable. All the vulnerabilities will be corrected in version C_0 or later (planned Q2 2026). - PM 877 (Symphony Plus MR) Devices with firmware versions reported in Affected products are vulnerable. All the vulnerabilities will be corrected with firmware version 3.53 or later (planned Q1 2026). - S+ Operations Versions reported in Affected products are vulnerable. All the vulnerabilities will be corrected in version 3.4 or later (released in January 2026). ABB recommends customers apply updates, as they become available, at their earliest convenience. It is also advisable to review the Mitigating Factors, Workarounds and General security recommendations sections for additional actions which may help reduce overall risk.
• The vulnerabilities announced in this Advisory for ABB Process Automation products require that an attacker has access to the system network and hosts which are generally expected to be protected. Process Control and IEC 61850 networks are NOT recommended to be exposed directly to Internet connections. If these networks are not properly isolated, then connected components may be remotely exploitable as described in this advisory. To exploit the vulnerability, an attacker with remote network access can send a specially crafted packet to the PM 877, CI850 and CI868 modules which causes the fault of these devices. S+ Operations only implements 61850 client services and therefore are not intended to listen to in-coming connection requests. However, if a specially crafted message is sent anyway, it can still cause the 61850-communication driver to crash. The usage of a perimeter firewall to allow legitimate client communications is an effective mitigation. Refer to section “General security recommendations” for further advise on how to keep your system secure.
• No workarounds are available. Assess the installation specific risk based on this advisory. Use the recommendations described under “Mitigating factors” or “Recommended immediate actions”.

Affected Vendors

Affected Products (15)

Affected Sectors

Chemical, Critical Manufacturing, Energy, Water and Wastewater, Water and Wastewater