CVE Vulnerabilities

CVE-2023-20222

Improper Neutralization of Script-Related HTML Tags in a Web Page (Basic XSS)

Published: Aug 16, 2023 | Modified: Nov 21, 2024
CVSS 3.x
6.1
MEDIUM
Source:
NVD
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N
CVSS 2.x
RedHat/V2
RedHat/V3
Ubuntu

A vulnerability in the web-based management interface of Cisco Prime Infrastructure and Cisco Evolved Programmable Network Manager (EPNM) could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to conduct a cross-site scripting (XSS) attack against a user of the interface on an affected device. The vulnerability is due to insufficient validation of user-supplied input by the web-based management interface of an affected system. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by injecting malicious code into specific pages of the interface. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to execute arbitrary script code in the context of the affected interface or access sensitive, browser-based information.

Weakness

The product receives input from an upstream component, but it does not neutralize or incorrectly neutralizes special characters such as “<”, “>”, and “&” that could be interpreted as web-scripting elements when they are sent to a downstream component that processes web pages.

Affected Software

Name Vendor Start Version End Version
Evolved_programmable_network_manager Cisco * 7.0 (including)
Prime_infrastructure Cisco * 3.10 (including)

Potential Mitigations

  • Use and specify an output encoding that can be handled by the downstream component that is reading the output. Common encodings include ISO-8859-1, UTF-7, and UTF-8. When an encoding is not specified, a downstream component may choose a different encoding, either by assuming a default encoding or automatically inferring which encoding is being used, which can be erroneous. When the encodings are inconsistent, the downstream component might treat some character or byte sequences as special, even if they are not special in the original encoding. Attackers might then be able to exploit this discrepancy and conduct injection attacks; they even might be able to bypass protection mechanisms that assume the original encoding is also being used by the downstream component.
  • The problem of inconsistent output encodings often arises in web pages. If an encoding is not specified in an HTTP header, web browsers often guess about which encoding is being used. This can open up the browser to subtle XSS attacks.

References