CVE-2016-20054 in nodCMS
Summary
by MITRE • 04/04/2026
Nodcms contains a cross-site request forgery vulnerability that allows attackers to perform unauthorized administrative actions by crafting malicious forms. Attackers can trick authenticated administrators into submitting requests to admin/user_manipulate and admin/settings/generall endpoints to create users or modify application settings without explicit consent.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 07/21/2026
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2016-20054 resides within the Nodcms content management system, representing a critical cross-site request forgery flaw that fundamentally undermines the application's administrative security controls. This weakness enables malicious actors to exploit the trust relationship between authenticated administrators and the web application, creating a pathway for unauthorized modifications to system configurations and user management operations. The vulnerability specifically targets the admin/user_manipulate and admin/settings/generall endpoints, which serve as critical administrative interfaces for user account creation and system-wide configuration changes.
The technical implementation of this CSRF vulnerability stems from the absence of proper validation mechanisms to verify the origin and authenticity of requests submitted to administrative endpoints. When administrators navigate to maliciously crafted web pages, their browsers automatically submit requests to the vulnerable Nodcms administration interfaces without their knowledge or explicit consent. This occurs because the application fails to implement anti-CSRF tokens or other validation controls that would ensure requests originate from legitimate administrative sessions. The flaw operates at the application layer, specifically within the web application's request handling and authentication validation processes, making it particularly dangerous as it bypasses normal user permission controls.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple unauthorized access, as it provides attackers with the capability to establish persistent administrative control over affected systems. An attacker who successfully exploits this vulnerability can create new administrative user accounts with full privileges, modify critical system settings, alter user permissions, and potentially gain access to sensitive data repositories. This compromise can lead to complete system takeover, data exfiltration, and the establishment of backdoors for continued unauthorized access. The vulnerability affects the integrity and availability of the entire content management system, potentially causing service disruption and data corruption. According to CWE classification, this represents a CWE-352 vulnerability, specifically a Cross-Site Request Forgery weakness that allows attackers to perform unauthorized actions on behalf of authenticated users.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability must address both immediate remediation and long-term security hardening measures. The most effective immediate solution involves implementing proper anti-CSRF token mechanisms across all administrative endpoints, ensuring that each request contains a unique, unpredictable token that validates the request's origin and user intent. Organizations should also implement strict referer header validation and implement SameSite cookie attributes to prevent cross-site request forgery attacks. Additionally, the application should enforce time-based session validation and implement proper request origin verification mechanisms. According to ATT&CK framework, this vulnerability aligns with T1566.001 (Phishing) and T1078.004 (Valid Accounts) attack techniques, as attackers typically leverage social engineering to deliver malicious payloads that exploit this weakness. Regular security audits and input validation checks should be implemented to prevent similar vulnerabilities from emerging in future versions of the application.
The broader implications of this vulnerability highlight the critical importance of implementing comprehensive security controls throughout the application development lifecycle. Organizations using Nodcms or similar content management systems must ensure that administrative interfaces are properly protected against CSRF attacks, as these vulnerabilities represent one of the most common attack vectors for gaining unauthorized administrative access. The vulnerability also underscores the necessity of regular security assessments and vulnerability scanning to identify and remediate such weaknesses before they can be exploited by malicious actors in the wild.