CVE-2018-16387 in Elefant
Summary
by MITRE
An issue was discovered in Elefant CMS before 2.0.5. There is a CSRF vulnerability that can add an account via user/add.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 05/06/2023
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2018-16387 represents a cross-site request forgery flaw within Elefant CMS versions prior to 2.0.5. This security weakness allows unauthorized attackers to perform actions on behalf of authenticated users without their knowledge or consent. The specific vulnerability occurs within the user management functionality of the content management system, particularly affecting the user/add endpoint which handles account creation requests.
This CSRF vulnerability stems from the absence of proper validation mechanisms to verify the authenticity of requests originating from legitimate users. The flaw enables attackers to craft malicious requests that, when executed by authenticated users, result in unauthorized account creation within the CMS. The vulnerability exists because the application fails to implement anti-CSRF tokens or other sufficient protections to ensure that requests are genuinely initiated by the user rather than being submitted through malicious web pages or scripts.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple account creation, as it provides attackers with a potential foothold for further exploitation within the CMS environment. An attacker could leverage this vulnerability to create accounts with elevated privileges, potentially gaining access to sensitive administrative functions and data. The implications are particularly concerning in environments where CMS administrators have significant control over website content and user management, as the creation of unauthorized accounts could lead to data manipulation, content tampering, or even complete system compromise.
The technical nature of this vulnerability aligns with CWE-352, which specifically addresses Cross-Site Request Forgery weaknesses in software applications. This classification emphasizes the fundamental flaw in the application's request validation process and highlights the need for robust anti-CSRF mechanisms. From an attacker perspective, this vulnerability maps to several ATT&CK techniques including T1078 for valid accounts and T1566 for social engineering tactics that could be employed to trick users into executing malicious requests.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability should include implementing proper CSRF token validation mechanisms within the Elefant CMS application. The system must generate unique, unpredictable tokens for each user session and validate these tokens with every state-changing request. Additionally, organizations should ensure that all versions of Elefant CMS are updated to 2.0.5 or later, which contains the necessary patches to address this security flaw. Security monitoring should also be enhanced to detect unusual account creation patterns that could indicate exploitation attempts. Regular security assessments and penetration testing should be conducted to identify similar vulnerabilities in other components of the web application stack.