CVE-2023-22692 in Name Directory Plugin
Summary
by MITRE • 05/22/2023
Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in Jeroen Peters Name Directory plugin <= 1.27.1 versions.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 06/15/2023
The CVE-2023-22692 vulnerability represents a critical cross-site request forgery flaw discovered in the Jeroen Peters Name Directory WordPress plugin, affecting versions up to and including 1.27.1. This vulnerability resides within the plugin's handling of user requests and authentication mechanisms, creating a significant security risk for WordPress installations that utilize this directory management tool. The flaw allows malicious actors to exploit the absence of proper anti-CSRF protections in the plugin's administrative interfaces, potentially enabling unauthorized actions on behalf of authenticated users. The vulnerability specifically impacts the plugin's ability to validate the authenticity of requests originating from legitimate users versus those crafted by attackers, undermining the fundamental security principles of web application authentication and authorization.
The technical implementation of this CSRF vulnerability stems from the plugin's failure to implement proper request validation tokens or origin checking mechanisms within its administrative endpoints. When users access the name directory plugin's administrative functions, the system should verify that requests originate from legitimate sources and contain valid authentication tokens. However, the vulnerable versions lack these essential protections, allowing attackers to construct malicious requests that appear to come from authenticated users. This weakness enables attackers to perform unauthorized operations such as adding, modifying, or deleting directory entries without proper authorization. The flaw operates at the application layer and directly violates the principle of least privilege by allowing unauthorized modifications to directory data through manipulated HTTP requests that bypass normal authentication checks.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple data manipulation to potentially compromise the entire WordPress installation's integrity and user trust. An attacker exploiting this CSRF vulnerability could add malicious entries to the directory, modify existing records to contain malicious links or content, or even delete critical directory information. This could lead to information disclosure, service disruption, or provide a foothold for further attacks within the WordPress environment. The vulnerability affects all users with administrative privileges who are logged into the WordPress site, making it particularly dangerous in environments where administrators frequently access the site. Additionally, the impact is amplified because the vulnerability exists within a plugin that may be used by organizations for business-critical directory services, potentially exposing sensitive organizational information or providing attackers with additional attack vectors.
Organizations should immediately implement mitigations including updating to the patched version of the Jeroen Peters Name Directory plugin, which addresses the CSRF protection gaps through the implementation of proper anti-CSRF tokens. The vulnerability aligns with CWE-352, which specifically addresses Cross-Site Request Forgery weaknesses in software applications, and represents a clear violation of the principle that web applications must validate the origin and authenticity of all requests. Security teams should also consider implementing additional protective measures such as network-level firewalls to restrict access to administrative endpoints, implementing web application firewalls to detect and block suspicious request patterns, and conducting thorough security audits of all installed plugins. The ATT&CK framework categorizes this vulnerability under the T1566 technique for initial access through web application attacks, while the remediation efforts should align with T1543 for persistence mechanisms and T1071 for application layer protocols to ensure comprehensive security coverage. Regular security monitoring and vulnerability assessment procedures should be enhanced to detect similar CSRF vulnerabilities in other plugins and custom applications, as this represents a common pattern in web application security flaws that require consistent remediation strategies.