CVE-2024-12132 in WP Job Portal Plugin
Summary
by MITRE • 01/03/2025
The WP Job Portal – A Complete Recruitment System for Company or Job Board website plugin for WordPress is vulnerable to Insecure Direct Object Reference in all versions up to, and including, 2.2.4 due to missing validation on a user controlled key. This makes it possible for authenticated attackers, with Subscriber-level access and above, to create jobs for companies that are unaffiliated with the attacker.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 01/03/2025
The WP Job Portal plugin for WordPress represents a comprehensive recruitment system designed to facilitate job board operations and company listings within WordPress environments. This plugin serves as a critical component for organizations seeking to manage employment opportunities and corporate profiles through their websites. The vulnerability identified in versions up to and including 2.2.4 stems from a fundamental security flaw in the plugin's object reference handling mechanisms, creating a pathway for unauthorized privilege escalation within the system's access control framework. The issue manifests specifically in the plugin's inability to properly validate user-controlled input parameters that determine company associations during job creation processes, thereby undermining the integrity of the system's authorization controls.
The technical flaw constitutes an insecure direct object reference vulnerability that operates at the application level, specifically within the plugin's job creation functionality. This vulnerability allows authenticated users with subscriber privileges or higher to manipulate object references by supplying crafted parameters that bypass normal authorization checks. The root cause lies in the absence of proper validation on user-controlled keys that determine company affiliations when creating new job listings. Attackers can exploit this weakness by crafting requests that reference company objects they should not have access to, effectively enabling them to associate job postings with companies that are not affiliated with their own user accounts. This represents a direct violation of the principle of least privilege and demonstrates inadequate input sanitization within the plugin's core logic.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple data manipulation to encompass significant security implications for organizations relying on the plugin for recruitment operations. Authenticated attackers can potentially create fraudulent job listings that appear to originate from legitimate companies, leading to reputational damage and potential financial fraud. The vulnerability enables attackers to bypass the plugin's intended company ownership controls, allowing them to publish job opportunities under company names they do not control. This capability could be exploited to spread misinformation, conduct phishing campaigns, or create misleading employment opportunities that could deceive job seekers. The implications are particularly severe for organizations managing multiple company profiles or those with strict corporate governance requirements for job posting authorization.
From a cybersecurity framework perspective, this vulnerability aligns with CWE-639, which describes insecure direct object reference flaws that allow attackers to bypass authorization checks and access objects they should not be permitted to access. The vulnerability also maps to several ATT&CK techniques including privilege escalation and credential access, as attackers can leverage their existing subscriber-level access to gain unauthorized capabilities within the system. Organizations should implement immediate mitigation strategies including updating to the patched version of the plugin, implementing additional access controls, and monitoring for unauthorized job creation activities. The vulnerability highlights the importance of proper input validation and authorization checking within web applications, particularly those handling sensitive business data and user-generated content. Security teams should also consider implementing network-level monitoring to detect anomalous job creation patterns that might indicate exploitation attempts.