WordPress Countdown Widget <= 3.1.9.1 - Cross-Site Request Forgery to Plugin Settings Update
Strategic Overview
- Status
- Patched in 3.1.9.2
- Affected Plugin
- WordPress Countdown Widget
- Affected Version
<= 3.1.9.1- CVSS
- 8.8High
- Weakness type
- CWE-352 · Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
- CVE
CVE-2022-45847
At a glance
CVE-2022-45847 is a high-severity Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in the WordPress Countdown Widget WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 3.1.9.1. It carries a CVSS score of 8.8 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity; high confidentiality, integrity, availability impact). Exploitation requires no authentication. The issue is fixed in version 3.1.9.2; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed September 2022, reported by Rasi.
Vulnerability Overview
The WordPress Countdown Widget plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Cross-Site Request Forgery in versions up to, and including, 3.1.9.1. This is due to missing or incorrect nonce validation on the admin_header function. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attackers to change plugin settings, via forged request granted they can trick a site administrator into performing an action such as clicking on a link.
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. A successful exploit has high impact on confidentiality, integrity, availability — full site compromise territory.
CWE-352: Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
Reaching this weakness in WordPress Countdown Widget <= 3.1.9.1 takes a caller who can reach the endpoint. Cross-site request forgery abuses the fact that browsers attach a victim's cookies to any request, so a state-changing action that only checks who you are, not whether you meant to act, can be triggered from another site.
An attacker who gets a logged-in user to load a crafted page can perform that action as them, with the impact scaling to whatever the victim's role is allowed to do. For WordPress Countdown Widget the fix is 3.1.9.2: builds <= 3.1.9.1 are affected, anything from 3.1.9.2 onward is not.
Remediation
Update to version 3.1.9.2, or a newer patched version
How does WordSec protect against this?
The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to WordPress Countdown Widget: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: WordPress Countdown Widget 3.1.9.2 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.
- Firewall
- Alerts
External References
Related records
Other vulnerabilities in WordPress Countdown Widget
Vulnerability data © Defiant, Inc., provided under the Wordfence Intelligence T&C