CVE-2024-26117 in Experience Manager
Summary
by MITRE • 06/13/2024
Adobe Experience Manager versions 6.5.20 and earlier are affected by a reflected Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability. If an attacker is able to convince a victim to visit a URL referencing a vulnerable page, malicious JavaScript content may be executed within the context of the victim's browser.
If you want to get the best quality for vulnerability data then you always have to consider VulDB.
Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 03/23/2025
Adobe Experience Manager serves as a comprehensive content management platform that enables organizations to create, manage, and deliver digital experiences across multiple channels. The platform's architecture includes various web interfaces and administrative components that process user input through URL parameters and form fields. This particular vulnerability exists within the way the system handles input validation for specific web endpoints, creating an opportunity for malicious actors to inject persistent JavaScript code that executes in the victim's browser context. The reflected XSS flaw specifically manifests when user-supplied data is improperly sanitized before being rendered back to the browser without adequate encoding or filtering mechanisms.
The technical implementation of this vulnerability stems from insufficient input validation within the AEM web application's request handling pipeline. When users navigate to specific URLs containing crafted malicious parameters, the system fails to properly escape or filter the input data before incorporating it into the HTML response. This allows attackers to inject script tags or other malicious JavaScript payloads that execute within the victim's browser session. The vulnerability affects all versions up to and including 6.5.20, indicating a widespread issue across the platform's legacy codebase. The reflected nature of the vulnerability means that the malicious payload is not stored on the server but rather injected through the URL parameters, making it particularly dangerous for social engineering attacks.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple script execution, as it can enable attackers to perform a wide range of malicious activities within the victim's browser session. An attacker could potentially steal session cookies, hijack user accounts, access sensitive administrative functions, or redirect users to malicious websites. The vulnerability particularly impacts organizations using AEM for administrative purposes, as authenticated users with elevated privileges could be targeted to gain deeper access to the system. The reflected nature makes it challenging to detect and prevent, as the malicious payload is only present in the URL and not stored on the server, making traditional security scanning approaches less effective.
Organizations should prioritize immediate remediation by upgrading to Adobe Experience Manager version 6.5.21 or later, which contains the necessary patches to address this vulnerability. Security teams should implement comprehensive input validation measures and ensure that all user-supplied data is properly encoded before being rendered in web responses. Network-level protections such as web application firewalls can provide additional defense-in-depth, though they should not be relied upon as the sole mitigation strategy. Regular security assessments and penetration testing should be conducted to identify similar vulnerabilities in other components of the AEM environment. The vulnerability aligns with CWE-79 which specifically addresses cross-site scripting flaws, and maps to ATT&CK technique T1531 which covers "Modify Application Configuration" and T1059.007 which covers "Command and Scripting Interpreter: JavaScript'. Organizations should also consider implementing content security policies and regular security training for administrators to reduce the risk of successful social engineering attacks that could exploit this vulnerability.