WordPress GDPR & CCPA <= 1.9.26 Reflected Cross-Site Scripting
Strategic Overview
- Status
- Patched in 1.9.27
- Affected Plugin
- WordPress GDPR
- Affected Version
< 1.9.27- CVSS
- 6.5Medium
- Weakness type
- CWE-79 · Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')
- CVE
CVE-2022-0220
At a glance
CVE-2022-0220 is a medium-severity Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') vulnerability in the WordPress GDPR WordPress plugin, affecting versions < 1.9.27. It carries a CVSS score of 6.5 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity). Exploitation requires no authentication. The issue is fixed in version 1.9.27; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed January 2022, reported by Ace Candelario.
Vulnerability Overview
The check_privacy_settings AJAX action of the WordPress GDPR WordPress plugin before 1.9.27, available to both unauthenticated and authenticated users, responds with JSON data without an "application/json" content-type. Since an HTML payload isn't properly escaped, it may be interpreted by a web browser led to this endpoint. Javascript code may be executed on a victim's browser. Due to v1.9.26 adding a CSRF check, the XSS is only exploitable against unauthenticated users (as they all share the same nonce)
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 WordPress GDPR < 1.9.27 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 WordPress GDPR the fix is 1.9.27: builds < 1.9.27 are affected, anything from 1.9.27 onward is not.
Remediation
Update to version 1.9.27, or a newer patched version
How does WordSec protect against this?
The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to WordPress GDPR: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: WordPress GDPR 1.9.27 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.
- Firewall
- Alerts
External References
Related records
Same weakness class
Other vulnerabilities in WordPress GDPR
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