CVE-2004-1867 in Fresh Guest Book
Summary
by MITRE
Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in guest.cgi in Fresh Guest Book allows remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via the Name field.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 09/03/2024
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2004-1867 represents a classic cross-site scripting flaw within the Fresh Guest Book application's guest.cgi script. This security weakness resides specifically in the handling of user input through the Name field parameter, creating an exploitable condition that allows malicious actors to inject arbitrary web script or HTML code into the application's output. The vulnerability falls under the broader category of input validation failures that have plagued web applications for decades, demonstrating how insufficient sanitization of user-supplied data can lead to severe security implications.
This particular XSS vulnerability operates by failing to properly encode or validate the Name field input before rendering it back to users within the guest book interface. When a malicious user submits crafted script code through this field, the application processes and displays the content without adequate protection mechanisms, thereby executing the injected payload in the context of other users' browsers. The flaw represents a type 1 cross-site scripting vulnerability according to the OWASP classification system, where the malicious script originates from the application's own domain, making it particularly dangerous as it can bypass certain browser security measures that might otherwise prevent execution.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple data theft or defacement, as it provides attackers with the ability to perform session hijacking, steal cookies, redirect users to malicious sites, or even execute arbitrary commands on affected systems. The vulnerability affects any user who views the guest book entries, potentially compromising thousands of visitors depending on the application's usage and reach. This type of vulnerability directly maps to CWE-79 which specifically addresses cross-site scripting flaws in web applications, and aligns with ATT&CK technique T1531 which describes the use of malicious content to compromise user sessions. The attack vector requires minimal sophistication, making it particularly dangerous as it can be exploited by attackers with limited technical expertise.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability must focus on implementing robust input validation and output encoding mechanisms. The primary defense involves sanitizing all user input through proper encoding before rendering it within the web page context, specifically implementing HTML entity encoding for the Name field and other user-supplied parameters. Additionally, developers should implement proper content security policies to prevent unauthorized script execution, utilize input validation libraries, and consider implementing a whitelist approach for acceptable input characters. The vulnerability also underscores the importance of regular security audits and code reviews to identify similar input handling issues across the entire application stack, as such flaws often exist in multiple components of legacy web applications. Organizations should also consider implementing web application firewalls and monitoring systems to detect and prevent exploitation attempts of known XSS vulnerabilities.