Horilla is a free and open source Human Resource Management System (HRMS). Version 1.4.0 has Improper Access Control, allowing low-privileged employees to self-approve documents they have uploaded. The document-approval UI is intended to be restricted to administrator or high-privilege roles only; however, an insufficient server-side authorization check on the approval endpoint lets a standard employee modify the approval status of their own uploaded document. A successful exploitation allows users with only employee-level permissions to alter application state reserved for administrators. This undermines the integrity of HR processes (for example, acceptance of credentials, certifications, or supporting materials), and may enable submission of unvetted documents. This issue is fixed in version 1.5.0.
Weakness
The product does not restrict or incorrectly restricts access to a resource from an unauthorized actor.
Affected Software
| Name | Vendor | Start Version | End Version |
|---|---|---|---|
| Horilla | Horilla | 1.4.0 (including) | 1.4.0 (including) |
Extended Description
Access control involves the use of several protection mechanisms such as:
When any mechanism is not applied or otherwise fails, attackers can compromise the security of the product by gaining privileges, reading sensitive information, executing commands, evading detection, etc. There are two distinct behaviors that can introduce access control weaknesses:
Potential Mitigations
- Compartmentalize the system to have “safe” areas where trust boundaries can be unambiguously drawn. Do not allow sensitive data to go outside of the trust boundary and always be careful when interfacing with a compartment outside of the safe area.
- Ensure that appropriate compartmentalization is built into the system design, and the compartmentalization allows for and reinforces privilege separation functionality. Architects and designers should rely on the principle of least privilege to decide the appropriate time to use privileges and the time to drop privileges.
Related Attack Patterns
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/19.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/441.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/478.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/479.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/502.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/503.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/536.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/546.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/550.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/551.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/552.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/556.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/558.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/562.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/563.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/564.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/578.html