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org.xwiki.rendering:xwiki-rendering-xml Improper Neutralization of Invalid Characters in Identifiers in Web Pages vulnerability

Critical severity GitHub Reviewed Published Oct 25, 2023 in xwiki/xwiki-rendering • Updated Nov 10, 2023

Package

maven org.xwiki.rendering:xwiki-rendering-xml (Maven)

Affected versions

>= 14.6-rc-1, < 14.10.4

Patched versions

14.10.4

Description

Impact

The cleaning of attributes during XHTML rendering, introduced in version 14.6-rc-1, allowed the injection of arbitrary HTML code and thus cross-site scripting via invalid attribute names. This can be exploited, e.g., via the link syntax in any content that supports XWiki syntax like comments in XWiki:

[[Link1>>https://XWiki.example.com||/onmouseover="alert('XSS1')"]]

When a user moves the mouse over this link, the malicious JavaScript code is executed in the context of the user session. When this user is a privileged user who has programming rights, this allows server-side code execution with programming rights, impacting the confidentiality, integrity and availability of the XWiki instance.

While this attribute was correctly recognized as not allowed, the attribute was still printed with a prefix data-xwiki-translated-attribute- without further cleaning or validation.

Note that while versions below 14.6 are not vulnerable to this particular vulnerability, they are still vulnerable to XSS through attributes in XWiki syntax, see the corresponding advisory.

Patches

This problem has been patched in XWiki 14.10.4 and 15.0 RC1 by removing characters not allowed in data attributes and then validating the cleaned attribute again.

Workarounds

There are no known workarounds apart from upgrading to a version including the fix.

References

For more information

If you have any questions or comments about this advisory:

References

@michitux michitux published to xwiki/xwiki-rendering Oct 25, 2023
Published by the National Vulnerability Database Oct 25, 2023
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Oct 25, 2023
Reviewed Oct 25, 2023
Last updated Nov 10, 2023

Severity

Critical

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
None
User interaction
Required
Scope
Changed
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
High

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H

EPSS score

0.088%
(38th percentile)

CVE ID

CVE-2023-37908

GHSA ID

GHSA-663w-2xp3-5739

Source code

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