CVE-2005-0880 in Vortex Portal
Summary
by MITRE
content.php in Vortex Portal allows remote attackers to obtain sensitive information via an invalid act parameter, which leaks the full pathname in a PHP error message.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 07/22/2017
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2005-0880 resides within the content.php script of the Vortex Portal web application, representing a classic information disclosure flaw that exposes critical system details to remote attackers. This vulnerability specifically manifests when the application processes an invalid act parameter, causing the PHP runtime environment to generate an error message that inadvertently reveals the full server pathname. Such information leakage constitutes a fundamental security weakness that directly violates security best practices and provides attackers with valuable reconnaissance data for subsequent exploitation attempts.
The technical mechanism behind this vulnerability operates through improper input validation and error handling within the Vortex Portal's content.php script. When an attacker submits a malformed act parameter to the application, the system fails to properly sanitize or validate the input before processing it, leading to a PHP runtime error. The error message generated by the PHP interpreter includes the complete file path where the script is executing, effectively leaking the server's directory structure to unauthorized parties. This type of error handling flaw falls under the CWE-200 category of "Information Exposure" and specifically aligns with CWE-1174 which addresses improper error handling in web applications. The vulnerability demonstrates a clear failure in implementing proper exception handling and input validation mechanisms that should prevent sensitive information from being exposed to end users or attackers.
From an operational impact perspective, this vulnerability significantly weakens the security posture of systems running Vortex Portal by providing attackers with precise knowledge of the server's file system structure. The leaked pathname information enables attackers to better understand the application's deployment environment and potentially identify other vulnerabilities or misconfigurations within the system. This information disclosure can serve as a launching point for more sophisticated attacks, including directory traversal attempts, privilege escalation exploits, or targeted attacks against specific system components. The vulnerability also violates fundamental security principles outlined in the OWASP Top Ten 2017 category A03:2017 - Sensitive Data Exposure, which emphasizes the importance of protecting system information from unauthorized access. The exposure of file paths can also facilitate attacks against other applications running on the same server by providing insights into the hosting environment and potentially revealing other services or applications that might be running in adjacent directories.
The attack surface for this vulnerability is primarily through web-based reconnaissance activities where attackers can simply craft malicious requests containing invalid act parameters to trigger the error message. This makes the vulnerability particularly dangerous as it can be exploited by automated scanning tools and requires minimal technical expertise to identify and exploit. The vulnerability's impact is further amplified by the fact that it occurs in a core application file that likely handles multiple functions, meaning that successful exploitation could potentially reveal information about various system components and their configurations. Security professionals should consider this vulnerability when implementing defense-in-depth strategies, as it represents a failure in the application's input validation and error handling design that could be exploited as part of broader attack campaigns. The vulnerability also highlights the importance of implementing proper error handling procedures that do not expose system-level information to end users or external parties, aligning with the ATT&CK technique T1212 - Exploitation for Credential Access, where information disclosure serves as a prerequisite for more advanced attack vectors. Organizations should ensure that their applications implement generic error messages that do not reveal internal system details and should conduct regular security assessments to identify similar flaws in their web applications.