CVE-2020-9459

Modern Events Calendar Lite <= 5.1.6 - Missing Authorization to Stored Cross-Site Scripting and Settings Update

2020-02-27 00:00
Ram

Strategic Overview

Status
Patched in 5.1.7
Affected Plugin
Modern Events Calendar Lite
Affected Version
< 5.1.7
CVSS
5.4Medium
Weakness type
CWE-79 · Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')
CVE
CVE-2020-9459
View all Modern Events Calendar Lite vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2020-9459 is a medium-severity Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability in the Modern Events Calendar Lite WordPress plugin, affecting versions < 5.1.7. It carries a CVSS score of 5.4 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity). The root cause is a missing authorization check on a reachable function. The issue is fixed in version 5.1.7; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed February 2020, reported by Ram.

Vulnerability Overview

Multiple Stored Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities in the Webnus Modern Events Calendar Lite plugin through 5.1.6 for WordPress allows remote authenticated users (with minimal permissions) to inject arbitrary JavaScript, HTML, or CSS via Ajax actions. This affects mec_save_notifications and import_settings.

Technical Analysis

The vector marks this flaw as remotely reachable over the network, with low attack complexity — no special timing or configuration is needed.

CWE-79: Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')

Reaching this weakness in Modern Events Calendar Lite < 5.1.7 takes a caller who can reach the endpoint. 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 Modern Events Calendar Lite the fix is 5.1.7: builds < 5.1.7 are affected, anything from 5.1.7 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 5.1.7, or a newer patched version

How does WordSec protect against this?

The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to Modern Events Calendar Lite: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: Modern Events Calendar Lite 5.1.7 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

  • Firewall
  • Alerts

External References

https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2020-9459https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/86c04e9d-0bcd-4637-bd4a-aeb2e3f373ffhttps://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-9459

Related records

Vulnerability data © Defiant, Inc., provided under the Wordfence Intelligence T&C