CVE-2019-16931

Visualizer: Tables and Charts Manager for WordPress <= 3.3.0 - Stored Cross-Site Scripting

2019-09-28 00:00
Nathan Davison

Strategic Overview

Status
Patched in 3.3.1
Affected Plugin
Visualizer – Tables & Charts Manager with Built-in AI Generator
Affected Version
<= 3.3.0
CVSS
6.1Medium
Weakness type
CWE-79 · Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')
CVE
CVE-2019-16931
View all Visualizer – Tables & Charts Manager with Built-in AI Generator vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2019-16931 is a medium-severity Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability in the Visualizer WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 3.3.0. It carries a CVSS score of 6.1 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity). Exploitation requires no authentication. The issue is fixed in version 3.3.1; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed September 2019, reported by Nathan Davison.

Vulnerability Overview

A stored XSS vulnerability in the Visualizer plugin 3.3.0 for WordPress allows an unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary JavaScript when an admin or other privileged user edits the chart via the admin dashboard. This occurs because classes/Visualizer/Gutenberg/Block.php registers wp-json/visualizer/v1/update-chart with no access control, and classes/Visualizer/Render/Page/Data.php lacks output sanitization.

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.

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

Reaching this weakness in Visualizer <= 3.3.0 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 Visualizer the fix is 3.3.1: builds <= 3.3.0 are affected, anything from 3.3.1 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 3.3.1, or a newer patched version

How does WordSec protect against this?

The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to Visualizer: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: Visualizer 3.3.1 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

  • Firewall
  • Alerts

External References

https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2019-16931https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/eaaf1ac0-1ea6-4bcb-a385-87267525801chttps://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-16931

Related records

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