CVE-2016-11001

User Submitted Posts < 20160215 - Reflected Cross-Site Scripting

2016-02-10 00:00

Strategic Overview

Status: Patched in 20160215
Affected Plugin: User Submitted Posts – Enable Users to Submit Posts from the Front End
Affected Version: < 20160215
CVSS: 7.2High
Weakness type: CWE-79 · Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')
CVE: CVE-2016-11001

View all User Submitted Posts – Enable Users to Submit Posts from the Front End vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2016-11001 is a high-severity Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability in the User Submitted Posts WordPress plugin, affecting versions < 20160215. It carries a CVSS score of 7.2 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity). Exploitation requires no authentication. The issue is fixed in version 20160215; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed February 2016.

Vulnerability Overview

The user-submitted-posts plugin before 20160215 for WordPress has XSS via the user-submitted-content field.

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

Reaching this weakness in User Submitted Posts < 20160215 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 Submitted Posts the fix is 20160215: builds < 20160215 are affected, anything from 20160215 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 20160215, or a newer patched version

How does WordSec protect against this?

The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to User Submitted Posts: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: User Submitted Posts 20160215 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

Firewall
Alerts

External References

https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2016-11001 https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/da848ced-acc4-48bc-8fbe-e90cdd53b3e8 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2016-11001

Related records

Same weakness class

CVSS Vector

7.2

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N

Base

Attack VectorNetwork
Attack ComplexityLow
Privileges RequiredNone
User InteractionNone
ScopeChanged
ConfidentialityLow
IntegrityLow
AvailabilityNone

This record contains material that is subject to copyright

CVE Usage: MITRE hereby grants you a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, irrevocable copyright license to reproduce, prepare derivative works of, publicly display, publicly perform, sublicense, and distribute Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE®). Any copy you make for such purposes is authorized provided that you reproduce MITRE's copyright designation and this license in any such copy.

https://www.cve.org/Legal/TermsOfUse

Defiant hereby grants you a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, irrevocable copyright license to reproduce, prepare derivative works of, publicly display, publicly perform, sublicense, and distribute this software vulnerability information. Any copy of the software vulnerability information you make for such purposes is authorized provided that you include a hyperlink to this vulnerability record and reproduce Defiant's copyright designation and this license in any such copy.

https://www.wordfence.com/wordfence-intelligence-terms-and-conditions/