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JStachio XSS vulnerability: Unescaped single quotes

Moderate severity GitHub Reviewed Published May 29, 2023 in jstachio/jstachio • Updated Nov 11, 2023

Package

maven io.jstach:jstachio (Maven)

Affected versions

< 1.0.1

Patched versions

1.0.1

Description

Impact

Description:

JStachio fails to escape single quotes ' in HTML, allowing an attacker to inject malicious code.

Reproduction Steps:

Use the following template code:

<div attr='{{value}}'></div>

Set the value variable to ' onblur='alert(1).

public class Escaping {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        Model model = new Model("' onblur='alert(1)");
        String result = AttributeTemplate.of().execute(model);
        System.out.println(result);
    }

    @JStache(template = "<div attr='{{value}}'></div>",
            name="AttributeTemplate")
    @JStacheConfig(contentType= Html.class)
    public static class Model {

        public final String value;

        public Model(String value) {
            this.value = value;
        }

        public String getValue() {
            return value;
        }
    }
}

Expected Result:
The resulting output should have properly escaped the single quotes and not execute the injected JavaScript code.

Actual Result:
The resulting output is vulnerable and renders as follows:

<div attr='' onblur='alert(1)'></div>

Impact and Risk:

This vulnerability can be exploited by an attacker to execute arbitrary JavaScript code in the context of other users visiting pages that use this template engine. This can lead to various consequences, including session hijacking, defacement of web pages, theft of sensitive information, or even the propagation of malware.

Proposed Solution:

To mitigate this vulnerability, the template engine should properly escape special characters, including single quotes. Common practice is to escape ' as &#39.

Patches

Workarounds

As long as users stick with double quotes " for HTML attributes, they should not be affected.

References

For instance, Rocker's general purpose HTML escaping

References

@agentgt agentgt published to jstachio/jstachio May 29, 2023
Published by the National Vulnerability Database May 30, 2023
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Jun 6, 2023
Reviewed Jun 6, 2023
Last updated Nov 11, 2023

Severity

Moderate

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
Low
User interaction
Required
Scope
Changed
Confidentiality
Low
Integrity
Low
Availability
None

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N

EPSS score

0.112%
(46th percentile)

Weaknesses

CVE ID

CVE-2023-33962

GHSA ID

GHSA-gwxv-jv83-6qjr

Source code

Credits

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