User Notes <= 1.0.1 - Cross-Site Scripting
Strategic Overview
- Status
- Patched in 1.0.2
- Affected Plugin
- User Notes
- Affected Version
<= 1.0.1- CVSS
- 6.4Medium
- Weakness type
- CWE-79 · Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')
- CVE
CVE pending
At a glance
This record tracks a medium-severity Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability in the User Notes WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 1.0.1. It carries a CVSS score of 6.4 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity). The issue is fixed in version 1.0.2; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed April 2021.
Vulnerability Overview
The User Notes plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Cross-Site Scripting in versions up to, and including 1.0.1, due to insufficient input sanitization and output escaping on the 'user_notes_note' parameter. This makes it possible for users with access to add user notes to inject malicious web scripts that could execute whenever a victim accesses a user's profile page.
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')
User Notes <= 1.0.1 carries this weakness at user_notes_note, and reaching it 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 User Notes the fix is 1.0.2: builds <= 1.0.1 are affected, anything from 1.0.2 onward is not.
Remediation
Update to version 1.0.2, or a newer patched version
How does WordSec protect against this?
The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to User Notes: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: User Notes 1.0.2 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.
- Firewall
- Alerts
External References
Related records
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