Analytics Cat – Google Analytics Made Easy <= 1.0.9 - Authenticated (Admin+) Stored Cross-Site Scripting
Strategic Overview
- Status
- Patched in 1.1.0
- Affected Plugin
- Analytics Cat – Google Analytics Made Easy
- Affected Version
<= 1.0.9- CVSS
- 5.5Medium
- Weakness type
- CWE-79 · Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')
- CVE
CVE-2022-40311
At a glance
CVE-2022-40311 is a medium-severity Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability in the Analytics Cat WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 1.0.9. It carries a CVSS score of 5.5 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity). Exploitation requires an authenticated account at Admin level or above. The issue is fixed in version 1.1.0; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed September 2022, reported by R3N0.
Vulnerability Overview
The Analytics Cat – Google Analytics Made Easy plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Stored Cross-Site Scripting via the plugin's settings parameter in versions up to, and including, 1.0.9 due to insufficient input sanitization and output escaping in the fca_ga_input() function. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers with administrative-level permissions to inject arbitrary web scripts in pages that will execute whenever a user accesses an injected page. This only affects multi-site installations and installations where unfiltered_html has been disabled.
Technical Analysis
The vector marks this flaw as remotely reachable over the network, with low attack complexity — no special timing or configuration is needed, and no interaction from a victim user.
CWE-79: Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')
Analytics Cat <= 1.0.9 carries this weakness at fca_ga_input(), and reaching it takes an account at Admin level or above. Cross-site scripting happens when input from a request is written into a page without being escaped for the context it lands in, so the browser parses attacker-supplied text as markup or script.
Injected script runs with the privileges of whoever views the affected page, which is how these flaws turn into administrator session theft, silent account creation or persistent backdoors in page content. For Analytics Cat the fix is 1.1.0: builds <= 1.0.9 are affected, anything from 1.1.0 onward is not.
Remediation
Update to version 1.1.0, or a newer patched version
How does WordSec protect against this?
An attacker needs Admin access first, so the firewall sees the attempt as traffic from a logged-in account: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: Analytics Cat 1.1.0 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.
- Firewall
- Alerts
External References
Related records
Same weakness class
Other vulnerabilities in Analytics Cat – Google Analytics Made Easy
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