External Links <= 2.57 - Cross-Site Request Forgery via action_admin_action_wpel_dismiss_notice
Strategic Overview
- Status
- Patched in 2.58
- Affected Plugin
- External Links – nofollow, noopener & new window
- Affected Version
<= 2.57- CVSS
- 4.3Medium
- Weakness type
- CWE-352 · Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
- CVE
CVE pending
At a glance
This record tracks a medium-severity Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in the External Links WordPress plugin, affecting versions <= 2.57. It carries a CVSS score of 4.3 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity). Exploitation requires no authentication. The issue is fixed in version 2.58; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed March 2023.
Vulnerability Overview
The External Links plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Cross-Site Request Forgery in versions up to, and including, 2.5.7. This is due to missing or incorrect nonce validation on the 'action_admin_action_wpel_dismiss_notice' function. This makes it possible for unauthenticated attackers to dismiss the plugin's admin notifications 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.
CWE-352: Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
External Links <= 2.57 carries this weakness at action_admin_action_wpel_dismiss_notice, and reaching it 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 External Links the fix is 2.58: builds <= 2.57 are affected, anything from 2.58 onward is not.
Remediation
Update to version 2.58, or a newer patched version
How does WordSec protect against this?
The attempt arrives as an ordinary request to External Links: WordSec's web application firewall inspects request payloads before WordPress loads them. None of that substitutes for the fix: External Links 2.58 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.
- Firewall
- Alerts
External References
Related records
Other vulnerabilities in External Links – nofollow, noopener & new window
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