CVE-2018-5668

Read and Understood < 2.2 - Cross-Site Scripting

2018-12-13 00:00
d4wner

Strategic Overview

Status
Patched in 2.2
Affected Plugin
Read and Understood
Affected Version
< 2.2
CVSS
5.5Medium
Weakness type
CWE-79 · Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')
CVE
CVE-2018-5668
View all Read and Understood vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2018-5668 is a medium-severity Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability in the Read and Understood WordPress plugin, affecting versions < 2.2. It carries a CVSS score of 5.5 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity). The issue is fixed in version 2.2; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed December 2018, reported by d4wner.

Vulnerability Overview

An issue was discovered in the read-and-understood plugin 2.1 for WordPress. XSS exists via the wp-admin/options-general.php rnu_username_validation_title parameter.

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 interaction from a victim user.

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

Reaching this weakness in Read and Understood < 2.2 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 Read and Understood the fix is 2.2: builds < 2.2 are affected, anything from 2.2 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 2.2, or a newer patched version

How does WordSec protect against this?

The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to Read and Understood: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: Read and Understood 2.2 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

  • Firewall
  • Alerts

External References

Related records

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