CVE-2020-35948

Backup, Restore and Migrate WordPress Sites With the XCloner Plugin 4.2.1 - 4.2.12 - Unprotected AJAX Actions

2020-08-18 00:00
Chloe Chamberland

Strategic Overview

Status
Patched in 4.2.153
Affected Plugin
Backup, Restore and Migrate your sites with XCloner
Affected Version
4.2.1 – 4.2.12
CVSS
8.8High
Weakness type
CWE-862 · Missing Authorization
CVE
CVE-2020-35948
View all Backup, Restore and Migrate your sites with XCloner vulnerabilities

At a glance

CVE-2020-35948 is a high-severity Missing Authorization vulnerability in the Backup, Restore and Migrate your sites with XCloner WordPress plugin, affecting versions 4.2.1 – 4.2.12. It carries a CVSS score of 8.8 (reachable over the network; low attack complexity; high confidentiality, integrity, availability impact). The issue is fixed in version 4.2.153; sites on affected versions should update now. Disclosed August 2020, reported by Chloe Chamberland.

Vulnerability Overview

An issue was discovered in the XCloner Backup and Restore plugin before 4.2.13 for WordPress. It gave authenticated attackers the ability to modify arbitrary files, including PHP files. Doing so would allow an attacker to achieve remote code execution. The xcloner_restore.php write_file_action could overwrite wp-config.php, for example. Alternatively, an attacker could create an exploit chain to obtain a database dump.

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 interaction from a victim user. A successful exploit has high impact on confidentiality, integrity, availability — full site compromise territory.

CWE-862: Missing Authorization

Reaching this weakness in Backup, Restore and Migrate your sites with XCloner 4.2.1 – 4.2.12 takes a caller who can reach the endpoint. A missing authorization check means a function is reachable by anyone who can reach the endpoint, because the code never asks whether the caller is allowed to perform the action.

Any user who can reach the endpoint gets to run an action reserved for higher-privileged roles, from reading protected data to changing settings or content. For Backup, Restore and Migrate your sites with XCloner the fix is 4.2.153: builds 4.2.1 – 4.2.12 are affected, anything from 4.2.153 onward is not.

Remediation

Update to version 4.2.153, or a newer patched version

How does WordSec protect against this?

Because it turns on account access, WordSec's login security is the relevant layer: role-based two-factor, captcha and brute-force limits raise the cost of getting the account this needs. None of that substitutes for the fix: Backup, Restore and Migrate your sites with XCloner 4.2.153 closes this, and updating the plugin is the step that ends it.

  • Login Security
  • Alerts

External References

https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2020-35948https://www.wordfence.com/threat-intel/vulnerabilities/id/1c703856-9519-4181-9312-dcf862840bd9https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-35948

Related records

Vulnerability data © Defiant, Inc., provided under the Wordfence Intelligence T&C