CVE-2021-24916

Qubely – Advanced Gutenberg Blocks <= 1.8.5 - Insufficient Authorization

2023-07-17 00:00
Krzysztof Zając

Strategic Overview

Status
Patched in 1.8.6
Affected Plugin
Qubely – Advanced Gutenberg Blocks
Affected Version
< 1.8.6
CVSS
5.3Medium
Weakness type
CWE-863 · Incorrect Authorization
CVE
CVE-2021-24916
View all Qubely – Advanced Gutenberg Blocks vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2021-24916 is a medium-severity Incorrect Authorization vulnerability in the Qubely WordPress plugin, affecting versions < 1.8.6. It carries a CVSS score of 5.3 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity). Exploitation requires no authentication. The issue is fixed in version 1.8.6; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed July 2023, reported by Krzysztof Zając.

Vulnerability Overview

The Qubely plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to unauthorized arbitrary e-mail sending in versions up to, and including, 1.8.5. This is due to insufficient validation on the presence of a contact form block and validation on the email fields in the qubely_send_form_data() function called via an AJAX action. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attackers to send emails with arbitrary content to arbitrary addresses.

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.

CWE-863: Incorrect Authorization

Qubely < 1.8.6 carries this weakness at qubely_send_form_data(), and reaching it takes a caller who can reach the endpoint. Incorrect authorization means a permission check exists but evaluates the wrong thing, so it passes for callers it was meant to stop.

The action runs for users the code intended to exclude, with the same effect as having no check at all. For Qubely the fix is 1.8.6: builds < 1.8.6 are affected, anything from 1.8.6 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 1.8.6, 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: Qubely 1.8.6 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

  • Login Security
  • Alerts

External References

https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2021-24916https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/7a6b3ae2-796b-4084-ad19-4b67ea6dea25https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-24916

Related records

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