CVE-2005-2476 in Shopping Cart
Summary
by MITRE
Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in lost_passowrd.php in Naxtor Shopping Cart 1.0 allows remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via the email parameter.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 08/25/2025
The CVE-2005-2476 vulnerability represents a classic cross-site scripting flaw in the Naxtor Shopping Cart 1.0 web application, specifically within the lost_password.php component. This vulnerability arises from inadequate input validation and output encoding practices that fail to properly sanitize user-supplied data before processing or rendering it within the application's response. The affected parameter is the email field, which serves as an entry point for malicious actors to inject arbitrary web scripts or HTML content into the application's output, thereby compromising the security of unsuspecting users who interact with the vulnerable system.
The technical implementation of this vulnerability stems from the application's failure to implement proper input sanitization mechanisms for the email parameter. When users submit a password reset request through the lost_password.php script, the application accepts the email address without adequate validation or encoding, allowing attackers to inject malicious payloads directly into the form field. This weakness aligns with CWE-79, which categorizes cross-site scripting vulnerabilities as a result of insufficient input validation and output encoding. The vulnerability operates at the application layer, specifically targeting the web server's response generation mechanism where user input is directly incorporated into HTML output without proper sanitization.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple data corruption, as it provides attackers with the capability to execute arbitrary scripts within the context of authenticated users' browsers. This creates a significant risk for session hijacking, credential theft, and potential privilege escalation attacks. An attacker could craft malicious email addresses containing script tags that, when processed by the vulnerable application, would execute within the browser of any user who visits the affected page or interacts with the application's response. The vulnerability could be exploited through various attack vectors including phishing campaigns, social engineering, or direct injection attacks, making it particularly dangerous in e-commerce environments where user trust and session management are critical components of the security model.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability require immediate implementation of proper input validation and output encoding mechanisms throughout the application's codebase. The most effective approach involves implementing comprehensive input sanitization that filters out or encodes potentially dangerous characters such as angle brackets, script tags, and other HTML entities before processing user input. Additionally, developers should implement proper output encoding for all user-supplied data that is rendered within HTML contexts, ensuring that special characters are properly escaped to prevent their interpretation as executable code. This vulnerability demonstrates the critical importance of following secure coding practices and adheres to ATT&CK technique T1203, which covers the exploitation of web application vulnerabilities for code execution within user browsers. Organizations should also consider implementing Content Security Policy (CSP) headers as an additional defense-in-depth measure to prevent unauthorized script execution, while regular security audits and code reviews should be conducted to identify and remediate similar vulnerabilities across the entire application stack.