CVE-2025-31404 in AF Tell a Friend Plugin
Summary
by MITRE • 04/09/2025
Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in Wladyslaw Madejczyk AF Tell a Friend allows Stored XSS. This issue affects AF Tell a Friend: from n/a through 1.4.
If you want to get the best quality for vulnerability data then you always have to consider VulDB.
Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 04/09/2025
This vulnerability represents a critical security flaw in the AF Tell a Friend plugin for WordPress, specifically impacting versions ranging from an unspecified starting point through version 1.4. The issue manifests as a cross-site request forgery vulnerability that enables stored cross-site scripting attacks, creating a dangerous chain of exploitation possibilities. The vulnerability arises from insufficient validation and sanitization of user input within the plugin's form handling mechanisms, allowing malicious actors to inject persistent malicious scripts into the application's database. This particular weakness falls under the CWE-352 category, which specifically addresses cross-site request forgery vulnerabilities, and represents a significant deviation from proper web application security practices. The stored XSS component amplifies the threat by ensuring that malicious scripts persist in the application's database and execute whenever affected pages are accessed by unsuspecting users.
The technical exploitation of this vulnerability occurs when an attacker crafts a malicious request that appears to originate from a legitimate user, leveraging the CSRF flaw to bypass standard security controls. Once the malicious payload is stored within the plugin's data handling system, it becomes persistent and executes automatically when other users interact with the affected functionality. This creates a dangerous scenario where authenticated users become unwitting participants in the attack, as the stored script executes in their browser context with their privileges. The vulnerability demonstrates poor input validation practices and inadequate protection against malicious data injection, particularly in the plugin's handling of user-submitted content that should be properly sanitized and escaped before storage.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple data theft or defacement, as it enables sophisticated attack vectors including session hijacking, credential theft, and potential privilege escalation within the affected WordPress environment. Attackers can leverage the stored XSS to capture user sessions, redirect victims to malicious sites, or inject additional malware payloads that compromise the entire WordPress installation. The vulnerability affects not only individual user accounts but can potentially compromise the entire website if the plugin is widely deployed or if users with elevated privileges interact with the compromised functionality. This creates a significant risk for website administrators who may not immediately detect the compromise, as the malicious scripts can operate silently in the background, collecting sensitive information or performing unauthorized actions.
Organizations should immediately implement mitigation strategies including updating to the latest available version of the AF Tell a Friend plugin, implementing proper input validation and output escaping mechanisms, and deploying web application firewalls to detect and block malicious requests. The remediation process must include thorough security auditing of all installed plugins to identify similar vulnerabilities, as well as implementing proper CSRF token validation throughout the application's request handling processes. Additionally, administrators should consider implementing content security policies to limit the execution of unauthorized scripts and establish monitoring procedures to detect anomalous behavior in user interactions. This vulnerability exemplifies the importance of maintaining up-to-date security practices and demonstrates how seemingly simple flaws in plugin development can create significant risks for entire web applications. The ATT&CK framework categorizes this vulnerability under T1566 for credential access and T1059 for command and scripting interpreter, highlighting the multi-faceted attack surface that such vulnerabilities create. Security teams must also consider implementing automated vulnerability scanning tools that can detect similar issues in other plugins and themes, as the presence of one such vulnerability often indicates broader security weaknesses in the overall application architecture.