CVE-2023-48545 in Experience Manager
Summary
by MITRE • 12/15/2023
Adobe Experience Manager versions 6.5.18 and earlier are affected by a stored Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability that could be abused by a low-privileged attacker to inject malicious scripts into vulnerable form fields. Malicious JavaScript may be executed in a victim’s browser when they browse to the page containing the vulnerable field.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 01/06/2024
Adobe Experience Manager represents a comprehensive content management platform widely adopted by enterprises for digital experience management and web content delivery. The platform serves as a central hub for creating, managing, and publishing digital content across multiple channels while providing robust features for user authentication, form handling, and content personalization. Given its critical role in enterprise digital infrastructure, vulnerabilities within AEM can have significant implications for organizational security posture and data integrity. The platform's form handling capabilities are particularly important as they enable organizations to collect user input through various web forms while maintaining data validation and security controls.
The stored cross-site scripting vulnerability in Adobe Experience Manager versions 6.5.18 and earlier stems from insufficient input validation and output encoding within the form processing components. This flaw specifically affects how the system handles user-submitted data in form fields, failing to properly sanitize or escape malicious script content before storing it in the database or rendering it in subsequent page displays. The vulnerability manifests when low-privileged attackers submit malicious JavaScript payloads through form inputs that are then stored and subsequently executed when other users view pages containing these vulnerable fields. The root cause aligns with CWE-79 which defines improper neutralization of input during web page generation, specifically within stored XSS contexts where malicious content persists and executes in victim browsers.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple script execution as it enables attackers to perform various malicious activities including session hijacking, credential theft, data exfiltration, and redirection to malicious sites. Attackers can leverage this vulnerability to steal user sessions, access sensitive data, or manipulate the behavior of authenticated users within the AEM environment. The low privilege requirement means that even users with limited access rights can exploit this flaw, potentially escalating their access or compromising other users' sessions. This vulnerability particularly threatens organizations that rely heavily on form-based data collection, user registration, or feedback mechanisms within their AEM implementations.
Organizations should prioritize immediate remediation through the application of Adobe's official security patches released for this vulnerability. The patch addresses the core input validation and output encoding issues within the form handling components, ensuring that all user-submitted content is properly sanitized before storage and rendering. System administrators should also implement additional security controls including web application firewalls, input validation rules, and regular security assessments of form processing components. The mitigation strategy should align with ATT&CK framework's T1531 technique related to credential access through web application vulnerabilities, emphasizing the importance of proper input sanitization and output encoding as defensive measures. Organizations should conduct thorough testing of patched environments to ensure that the remediation does not introduce regressions in legitimate form functionality while maintaining the security posture against similar stored XSS vulnerabilities.