CVE-2023-51487 in ARI Stream Quiz Plugin
Summary
by MITRE • 03/16/2024
Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in ARI Soft ARI Stream Quiz.This issue affects ARI Stream Quiz: from n/a through 1.2.32.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 02/27/2025
The CVE-2023-51487 vulnerability represents a critical cross-site request forgery flaw within the ARI Soft ARI Stream Quiz application, a web-based educational platform designed for creating and managing online quizzes. This vulnerability exists in versions ranging from the initial release through 1.2.32, indicating a prolonged period during which the application remained susceptible to malicious exploitation. The flaw stems from insufficient validation of request origins and lack of proper anti-CSRF token implementation, allowing attackers to execute unauthorized actions on behalf of authenticated users. The vulnerability manifests when legitimate users interact with the quiz platform, making it particularly dangerous as it can be exploited through social engineering or by tricking users into visiting malicious websites that initiate unauthorized requests against the vulnerable application.
The technical implementation of this CSRF vulnerability occurs due to the application's failure to properly verify the referer header or implement anti-CSRF tokens in critical endpoints. When users navigate to the quiz platform and perform authenticated actions such as creating new quizzes, modifying existing content, or managing user accounts, the application processes these requests without adequate origin verification. This design flaw allows an attacker to craft malicious web pages or emails that contain embedded requests to the vulnerable ARI Stream Quiz application. The attack vector typically involves embedding malicious HTML forms or JavaScript code that automatically submits requests to the quiz platform's endpoints when a user visits the attacker-controlled page, leveraging the user's existing authentication session to perform unauthorized operations. The vulnerability specifically targets the application's state-changing functionality rather than data exposure, making it particularly dangerous for administrative and content management operations.
The operational impact of this CSRF vulnerability extends beyond simple data manipulation to encompass potential security breaches and service disruption within the ARI Stream Quiz environment. Attackers could exploit this vulnerability to delete quizzes, modify quiz configurations, alter user permissions, or even create new administrator accounts, leading to complete compromise of the quiz management system. The vulnerability affects all authenticated users within the application, meaning that any user with valid credentials could become a victim of such attacks. Given that quiz platforms often contain sensitive educational content and user data, the exploitation of this CSRF vulnerability could result in significant data integrity issues, unauthorized content modification, and potential exposure of student information. The impact is particularly severe in educational institutions where quiz platforms are used for assessment and examination purposes, as unauthorized modifications could compromise the validity and integrity of academic assessments.
Organizations using ARI Stream Quiz should immediately implement multiple layers of mitigation strategies to address this CSRF vulnerability. The most critical remediation involves implementing proper anti-CSRF token mechanisms across all state-changing endpoints, ensuring that each request contains a unique, unpredictable token that is validated server-side before processing. Additionally, implementing strict referer header validation and enforcing same-site cookies can provide additional protection against cross-site request forgery attacks. The application should also implement proper session management practices, including secure cookie attributes and session timeout mechanisms. Organizations should conduct thorough security testing and penetration testing to verify that the implemented fixes are effective and that no other CSRF vulnerabilities exist within the application. Compliance with industry standards such as CWE-352 for cross-site request forgery and ATT&CK technique T1566 for social engineering should be considered during remediation efforts to ensure comprehensive security coverage. Regular security updates and patch management procedures should be established to prevent similar vulnerabilities from emerging in future releases of the application.