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Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')

CVE-2021-41252

Severity Medium
Score 5.4/10

Summary

Kirby is an open source file structured CMS ### Impact Kirby's writer field stores its formatted content as HTML code. Unlike with other field types, it is not possible to escape HTML special characters against cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks, otherwise the formatting would be lost. If the user is logged in to the Panel, a harmful script can for example trigger requests to Kirby's API with the permissions of the victim. Because the writer field did not securely sanitize its contents on save, it was possible to inject malicious HTML code into the content file by sending it to Kirby's API directly without using the Panel. This malicious HTML code would then be displayed on the site frontend and executed in the browsers of site visitors and logged in users who are browsing the site. Attackers must be in your group of authenticated Panel users in order to exploit this weakness. Users who do not make use of the writer field are not affected. This issue has been patched in Kirby 3.5.8 by sanitizing all writer field contents on the backend whenever the content is modified via Kirby's API. Please update to this or a later version to fix the vulnerability.This vulnerability affects versions of 3.5.x prior to 3.5.8 and 3.6.x prior to 3.6.0-beta.2

  • LOW
  • NETWORK
  • LOW
  • CHANGED
  • REQUIRED
  • LOW
  • LOW
  • NONE

CWE-79 - Cross Site Scripting

Cross-Site Scripting, commonly referred to as XSS, is the most dominant class of vulnerabilities. It allows an attacker to inject malicious code into a pregnable web application and victimize its users. The exploitation of such a weakness can cause severe issues such as account takeover, and sensitive data exfiltration. Because of the prevalence of XSS vulnerabilities and their high rate of exploitation, it has remained in the OWASP top 10 vulnerabilities for years.

Advisory Timeline

  • Published