CVE-2014-6237 in News Pack
Summary
by MITRE
Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the News Pack extension 0.1.0 and earlier for TYPO3 allows remote authenticated users to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via unspecified vectors.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 03/13/2018
The CVE-2014-6237 vulnerability represents a critical cross-site scripting flaw within the News Pack extension for TYPO3 content management system. This vulnerability affects versions 0.1.0 and earlier, creating a significant security risk for organizations utilizing this specific extension. The flaw permits remote authenticated attackers to execute malicious web scripts or HTML code within the context of affected systems, potentially compromising user sessions and data integrity. The vulnerability's classification as a persistent XSS issue indicates that malicious content can be stored and subsequently executed when other users access the affected pages, making it particularly dangerous for web applications that process user-generated content.
The technical nature of this vulnerability stems from inadequate input validation and output encoding within the News Pack extension's handling of user-supplied data. Attackers can exploit this weakness by crafting malicious payloads that bypass the system's sanitization mechanisms, allowing their code to be stored in the application's database or configuration files. The unspecified vectors suggest that the vulnerability may exist across multiple input points within the extension's functionality, potentially affecting various modules including news article creation, comment systems, or administrative interfaces. This broad attack surface increases the likelihood of successful exploitation and makes the vulnerability particularly challenging to defend against.
The operational impact of CVE-2014-6237 extends beyond simple data theft or session hijacking, as authenticated attackers can manipulate the application's behavior and potentially escalate privileges. When users interact with compromised content, their browsers execute the injected scripts, which can perform actions such as stealing cookies, redirecting to malicious sites, or modifying page content. The authenticated nature of the attack means that exploitation requires valid user credentials, but this does not significantly reduce the threat level since attackers can obtain valid accounts through various means including credential theft, social engineering, or other initial compromise vectors. This vulnerability directly violates the principle of least privilege and can undermine the trust model of the entire TYPO3 installation.
Organizations affected by this vulnerability should prioritize immediate remediation through patching the News Pack extension to version 0.1.1 or later, which contains the necessary security fixes. Additionally, implementing comprehensive input validation measures and output encoding practices can provide defense-in-depth protection against similar vulnerabilities. Security teams should conduct thorough assessments of their TYPO3 installations to identify all instances of the vulnerable extension and ensure proper access controls are in place. The vulnerability aligns with CWE-79, which specifically addresses cross-site scripting flaws, and represents a classic example of how third-party extensions can introduce security weaknesses into otherwise secure applications. From an ATT&CK framework perspective, this vulnerability maps to the T1059.001 technique for command and scripting interpreter, as attackers can execute arbitrary code through the XSS vector, potentially leading to further compromise through techniques such as T1566 for credential access or T1071 for application layer protocols.