Blackhole for Bad Bots <= 3.3.1 - Arbitrary IP Address Blocking via IP Spoofing
Strategic Overview
- Status
- Patched in 3.3.2
- Affected Plugin
- Blackhole for Bad Bots
- Affected Version
< 3.3.2- CVSS
- 9.1Critical
- Weakness type
- CWE-639 · Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key
- CVE
CVE-2022-1165
At a glance
CVE-2022-1165 is a critical-severity Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key vulnerability in the Blackhole for Bad Bots WordPress plugin, affecting versions < 3.3.2. It carries a CVSS score of 9.1 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity; high integrity, availability impact). Exploitation requires no authentication. The issue is fixed in version 3.3.2; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed January 2022, reported by Daniel Ruf.
Vulnerability Overview
The Blackhole for Bad Bots WordPress plugin before 3.3.2 uses headers such as CF-CONNECTING-IP, CLIENT-IP etc to determine the IP address of requests hitting the blackhole URL, which allows them to be spoofed. This could result in blocking arbitrary IP addresses, such as legitimate/good search engine crawlers / bots. This could also be abused by competitors to cause damage related to visibility in search engines, can be used to bypass arbitrary blocks caused by this plugin, block any visitor or even the administrator and even more.
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 privileges on the target site, and no interaction from a victim user. A successful exploit has high impact on integrity, availability.
CWE-639: Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key
Reaching this weakness in Blackhole for Bad Bots < 3.3.2 takes a caller who can reach the endpoint. Authorization bypass through a user-controlled key, often called insecure direct object reference, means the application looks up a record by an identifier from the request without checking that the caller owns it.
Changing a number in the request is enough to read or modify other users' records, which on commerce and membership sites means customer data. For Blackhole for Bad Bots the fix is 3.3.2: builds < 3.3.2 are affected, anything from 3.3.2 onward is not.
Remediation
Update to version 3.3.2, or a newer patched version
How does WordSec protect against this?
Because it turns on account access, WordSec's login security is the relevant layer: role-based two-factor, captcha and brute-force limits raise the cost of getting the account this needs. None of that substitutes for the fix: Blackhole for Bad Bots 3.3.2 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.
- Login Security
- Alerts
External References
Related records
Other vulnerabilities in Blackhole for Bad Bots
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