CVE-2013-6310 in Marketing Platform
Summary
by MITRE
Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in IBM Marketing Platform 9.1 before FP2 allows remote authenticated users to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via unspecified vectors.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 03/11/2018
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2013-6310 represents a critical cross-site scripting flaw within IBM Marketing Platform version 9.1 prior to fix pack 2. This security weakness enables remote authenticated attackers to execute malicious web scripts or HTML code within the context of affected systems. The vulnerability stems from insufficient input validation and output encoding mechanisms that fail to properly sanitize user-supplied data before rendering it in web interfaces. IBM Marketing Platform serves as a comprehensive digital marketing solution that handles various user inputs through multiple administrative and content management interfaces, creating numerous potential attack vectors for XSS exploitation.
The technical implementation of this vulnerability manifests through unspecified vectors within the platform's web application framework, suggesting that multiple entry points may be susceptible to injection attacks. Attackers with valid authentication credentials can leverage this weakness to inject malicious scripts that execute in the browsers of other users who access affected pages. The flaw typically occurs when user-provided content is directly rendered without proper sanitization, allowing attackers to craft payloads that can steal session cookies, redirect users to malicious sites, or perform actions on behalf of authenticated users. This type of vulnerability falls under CWE-79 which specifically addresses cross-site scripting weaknesses in software applications.
The operational impact of CVE-2013-6310 extends beyond simple script injection, potentially enabling attackers to compromise entire user sessions and access sensitive marketing data. Given that IBM Marketing Platform handles various business-critical marketing activities including campaign management, user segmentation, and analytics reporting, successful exploitation could lead to data theft, unauthorized campaign modifications, or complete system compromise. The authenticated nature of the attack means that attackers must first obtain valid user credentials, but once achieved, they can leverage this vulnerability to escalate their privileges or extract sensitive information from the marketing platform's database. This vulnerability aligns with ATT&CK technique T1566 which covers credential access through various attack vectors including web application exploitation.
Organizations utilizing IBM Marketing Platform 9.1 should immediately implement the available fix pack 2 or apply the vendor-provided security patches to remediate this vulnerability. Additionally, network administrators should consider implementing web application firewalls and input validation controls to provide additional layers of defense. Regular security assessments and penetration testing should be conducted to identify similar vulnerabilities in other web applications within the organization's infrastructure. The vulnerability highlights the importance of proper input validation and output encoding practices as recommended by OWASP Top Ten security guidelines, particularly focusing on preventing XSS attacks through comprehensive sanitization of user inputs and proper context-aware output encoding mechanisms.