CVE-2017-17605 in Consumer Complaints Clone Script
Summary
by MITRE
Consumer Complaints Clone Script 1.0 has SQL Injection via the other-user-profile.php id parameter.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 08/24/2025
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2017-17605 affects the Consumer Complaints Clone Script version 1.0, representing a critical security flaw that exposes the application to unauthorized data access and manipulation. This issue manifests through the other-user-profile.php script where user input is improperly handled, creating an avenue for malicious actors to exploit the system through SQL injection techniques. The vulnerability resides in the id parameter processing, which fails to adequately sanitize or validate incoming data before incorporating it into database queries.
The technical implementation of this vulnerability stems from inadequate input validation and improper parameter handling within the web application's backend processing. When a user provides an id value through the other-user-profile.php endpoint, the script directly incorporates this parameter into SQL query construction without proper sanitization measures. This design flaw aligns with CWE-89, which specifically addresses SQL injection vulnerabilities where untrusted data is concatenated into SQL commands without adequate escaping or parameterization. The absence of proper input filtering mechanisms allows attackers to inject malicious SQL code that can manipulate database operations, potentially leading to unauthorized data retrieval, modification, or deletion.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple data exposure, creating significant risks for both the application's integrity and user privacy. An attacker exploiting this vulnerability could gain access to sensitive user information including personal details, complaint records, and potentially administrative credentials stored within the database. The attack surface is particularly concerning as it targets user profile functionality, which typically contains valuable personal information that organizations are required to protect under various privacy regulations. This vulnerability could enable data breaches that violate compliance requirements under standards such as gdpr, hipaa, and pci dss, potentially resulting in substantial financial penalties and reputational damage.
The exploitation of this vulnerability follows established attack patterns documented in the mitre att&ck framework under the technique of command and control communication and credential access. Attackers would typically craft malicious payloads targeting the id parameter, using sql injection techniques such as union-based queries or boolean-based inference to extract database contents. The attack vector represents a common entry point in web application security, where insufficient input validation creates opportunities for privilege escalation and data exfiltration. Organizations utilizing this script would be particularly vulnerable during peak complaint submission periods when user interaction increases, providing more opportunities for exploitation.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability must address both immediate remediation and long-term security improvements. The primary solution involves implementing proper parameterized queries or prepared statements throughout the application's database interaction layer, ensuring that user input is never directly concatenated into SQL commands. Input validation should be strengthened through whitelisting approaches that only accept expected data formats and ranges for the id parameter. Additionally, implementing proper error handling that does not expose database structure information to end users prevents attackers from gaining intelligence about the underlying database schema. Security headers and web application firewalls should be configured to detect and block common sql injection patterns, while regular security audits and code reviews should be conducted to identify similar vulnerabilities in other application components. The remediation process should follow secure coding practices aligned with owasp top ten and iso 27001 security standards to prevent recurrence of such vulnerabilities in future development cycles.