CVE-2021-24703

Download Plugin < 1.6.1 - Cross-Site Request Forgery

2021-10-19 00:00

Strategic Overview

Status: Patched in 1.6.1
Affected Plugin: Download Plugin
Affected Version: < 1.6.1
CVSS: 5.7Medium
Weakness type: CWE-352 · Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
CVE: CVE-2021-24703

View all Download Plugin vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2021-24703 is a medium-severity Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in the Download Plugin WordPress plugin, affecting versions < 1.6.1. It carries a CVSS score of 5.7 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity; high integrity impact). The issue is fixed in version 1.6.1; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed October 2021, reported by apple502j.

Vulnerability Overview

The Download Plugin WordPress plugin before 1.6.1 does not have capability and CSRF checks in the dpwap_plugin_activate AJAX action, allowing any authenticated users, such as subscribers, to activate plugins that are already installed.

Technical Analysis

The vector marks this flaw as remotely reachable over the network, with low attack complexity — no special timing or configuration is needed. A successful exploit has high impact on integrity.

CWE-352: Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)

Reaching this weakness in Download Plugin < 1.6.1 takes a caller who can reach the endpoint. Cross-site request forgery abuses the fact that browsers attach a victim's cookies to any request, so a state-changing action that only checks who you are, not whether you meant to act, can be triggered from another site.

An attacker who gets a logged-in user to load a crafted page can perform that action as them, with the impact scaling to whatever the victim's role is allowed to do. For Download Plugin the fix is 1.6.1: builds < 1.6.1 are affected, anything from 1.6.1 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 1.6.1, or a newer patched version

How does WordSec protect against this?

The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to Download Plugin: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: Download Plugin 1.6.1 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

Firewall
Alerts

External References

https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2021-24703 https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/585a7332-b063-463c-8077-68a860e14df2 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-24703

Related records

Same weakness class

4.3CVE-2022-36345: Download Plugin <= 2.0.4 Cross-Site Request ForgeryCVE-2022-36345

Other vulnerabilities in Download Plugin

CVSS Vector

5.7

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N

Base

Attack VectorNetwork
Attack ComplexityLow
Privileges RequiredLow
User InteractionRequired
ScopeUnchanged
ConfidentialityNone
IntegrityHigh
AvailabilityNone

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