#VU41740 Cross-site scripting in MediaWiki - CVE-2014-2853

Vulnerability identifier: #VU41740

Vulnerability risk: Low

CVSSv4.0: 2.7 [CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:L/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:U/U:Clear]

CVE-ID: CVE-2014-2853

CWE-ID: CWE-79

Exploitation vector: Network

Exploit availability: No

Vulnerable software:
MediaWiki
Web applications / CMS

Vendor: MediaWiki.org

Description

Vulnerability allows a remote attacker to perform XSS attacks.

The vulnerability is caused by an input validation error in includes/actions/InfoAction.php in MediaWiki before 1.21.9 and 1.22.x before 1.22.6 when processing sort key in an info action. A remote attacker can trick the victim to follow a specially crafted link and execute arbitrary HTML and script code in victim's browser in security context of vulnerable website.

Successful exploitation of this vulnerability may allow a remote attacker to steal potentially sensitive information, change appearance of the web page, perform phishing and drive-by-download attacks.

Mitigation
Install update from vendor's website.

Vulnerable software versions

MediaWiki: 1.1.0 - 1.19.14, 1.2.0 - 1.22.5, 1.3 - 1.3.15, 1.4 - 1.4.14, 1.5 - 1.5.8, 1.6.0 - 1.6.12, 1.7.0 - 1.7.3, 1.8.0 - 1.8.5, 1.9.0 - 1.9.6

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External links
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/mediawiki-announce/2014-April/000149.html
https://secunia.com/advisories/58262
https://www.securityfocus.com/bid/67068
https://www.securitytracker.com/id/1030161
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1091967
https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=63251
https://github.com/wikimedia/mediawiki-core/commit/0b695ae09aada343ab59be4a3c9963995a1143b6
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Release_notes/1.21#Changes_since_1.21.8
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Release_notes/1.22#Changes_since_1.22.5

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Q & A

Can this vulnerability be exploited remotely?

Yes. This vulnerability can be exploited by a remote non-authenticated attacker via the Internet.

Is there known malware, which exploits this vulnerability?

No. We are not aware of malware exploiting this vulnerability.