Strategic Overview
- Status
- Unpatched
- Affected Plugin
- Cost Calculator
- Affected Version
<= 1.8- CVSS
- 7.5High
- Weakness type
- CWE-98 · Improper Control of Filename for Include/Require Statement in PHP Program ('PHP Remote File Inclusion')
- CVE
CVE-2021-24820
At a glance
CVE-2021-24820 is a high-severity Improper Control of Filename for Include/Require Statement in PHP Program ('PHP Remote File Inclusion') vulnerability in the Cost Calculator WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 1.8. It carries a CVSS score of 7.5 (reachable over the network; high confidentiality, integrity, availability impact). Exploitation requires an authenticated account. No fixed release has been reported yet; treat installations running this software as exposed. Disclosed February 2022, reported by apple502j.
Vulnerability Overview
The Cost Calculator WordPress plugin through 1.7 allows authenticated users (Contributor+ in versions < 1.5, and Admin+ in versions <= 1.8) to perform path traversal and local PHP file inclusion on Windows Web Servers via the Cost Calculator post's Layout
Technical Analysis
The vector marks this flaw as remotely reachable over the network, and no interaction from a victim user. A successful exploit has high impact on confidentiality, integrity, availability — full site compromise territory.
CWE-98: Improper Control of Filename for Include/Require Statement in PHP Program ('PHP Remote File Inclusion')
Reaching this weakness in Cost Calculator <= 1.8 takes any authenticated account. PHP file inclusion means a path used by include or require is built from request data, so the file that gets executed is under the caller's influence.
Including an attacker-influenced file executes its contents, which is why this class is routinely chained with an upload or log-poisoning step to reach code execution. No fixed build of this plugin is recorded for Cost Calculator yet, so installs running <= 1.8 stay exposed until the vendor ships one.
Remediation
No known patch available. Please review the vulnerability's details in depth and employ mitigations based on your organization's risk tolerance. It may be best to uninstall the affected software and find a replacement.
How does WordSec protect against this?
The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to Cost Calculator: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. Classes like this one can leave something behind, so the staged malware scanner is the second half: it looks for dropped files and modified code rather than for the request that created them. No patched version is recorded yet, which is the case where a filtering layer matters most, because there is nothing to update to.
- Firewall
- Scanner
- Alerts
External References
Related records
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