CVE-2018-20971 in church-admin Plugin
Summary
by MITRE
The church-admin plugin before 1.2550 for WordPress has CSRF affecting the upload of a bible reading plan.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 11/26/2023
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2018-20971 resides within the church-admin plugin for WordPress systems, specifically affecting versions prior to 1.2550. This issue represents a cross-site request forgery vulnerability that fundamentally compromises the integrity of user interactions within the administrative interface. The plugin serves as a tool for church management and administration, providing features for organizing church activities, managing members, and handling various administrative tasks including the upload of bible reading plans. The CSRF flaw manifests when users perform actions within the plugin's administrative area, particularly during the upload process of bible reading plans, creating a dangerous attack vector that can be exploited by malicious actors.
The technical implementation of this vulnerability stems from the absence of proper anti-CSRF tokens within the plugin's form handling mechanisms. When administrators or authorized users navigate to the bible reading plan upload functionality, the plugin fails to validate the authenticity of the request origin, allowing attackers to craft malicious requests that appear to originate from legitimate users. This flaw operates under the principle that a user's browser will automatically include any necessary authentication cookies when making requests to the vulnerable plugin, effectively enabling unauthorized actions to be performed on behalf of authenticated users. The vulnerability specifically targets the upload functionality, which represents a critical administrative operation that could potentially allow attackers to introduce malicious content or manipulate existing reading plans.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple data manipulation, as it creates opportunities for privilege escalation and persistent threats within church administrative systems. An attacker could potentially upload malicious files disguised as bible reading plans, leading to potential code execution or data corruption within the WordPress environment. The attack surface is particularly concerning given that church administrative systems often contain sensitive personal information about congregants, making this vulnerability attractive to threat actors seeking to exploit organizational trust. Additionally, the ability to manipulate reading plans could disrupt church activities and communications, potentially affecting spiritual guidance and community engagement.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability must address both the immediate technical flaw and broader security hygiene practices. The primary solution involves upgrading to church-admin plugin version 1.2550 or later, which includes proper CSRF token implementation and validation mechanisms. Organizations should also implement comprehensive security monitoring to detect anomalous upload activities and establish robust access controls for administrative functions. The vulnerability aligns with CWE-352, which categorizes cross-site request forgery flaws as critical security weaknesses requiring proper token-based validation. From an ATT&CK framework perspective, this vulnerability maps to techniques involving privilege escalation and persistence, as attackers could use the upload functionality to establish long-term access or manipulate system configurations. Organizations should also consider implementing web application firewalls and security headers to provide additional layers of protection against similar CSRF attacks targeting WordPress plugins and themes.