GHSA-9hhf-xmcw-r3xg CVE-2024-22208
phpMyFAQ sharing FAQ functionality can easily be abused for phishing purposes
- Severity
- 6.5 / 10
- Medium · CVSS 3.1
- Exploit chance (EPSS)
- 0.74%
- Chance of exploitation in the next 30 days. Higher than 54.64% of scored vulnerabilities.
- Known exploited
- No
- Not in CISA's catalog
- Weakness
- CWE-863 Incorrect Authorization
- Fix
3.2.5- Upgrade phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq to this version or later
Description
Summary
The 'sharing FAQ' functionality allows any unauthenticated actor to misuse the phpMyFAQ application to send arbitrary emails to a large range of targets.
Details
The phpMyFAQ application has a functionality where anyone can share a FAQ item to others. The front-end of this functionality allows any phpMyFAQ articles to be shared with 5 email addresses. The application will then send these 5 emails. However, there are no controls over what link and content are shared. Furthermore, any unauthenticated actor can perform this action. There is a CAPTCHA in place, however the amount of people you email with a single request is not limited to 5 by the backend. An attacker can thus solve a single CAPTCHA and send thousands of emails at once.
PoC
We send the following form and capture the request. image
We now change the body to contain 50 email addresses instead of just 1, and send the request. The attacker can also change the body of the email to any phishing message. image
Below are the logs of the email server, proving that all these emails were sent. image
An attacker can also change the link that is sent in these emails. Making phishing even more possible. image
Impact
An attacker can utilize the target application's email server to send phishing messages. This can get the server on a blacklist, causing all emails to end up in spam. It can also lead to reputational damages.
Affected versions
Packagist
| Package | Vulnerable | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
| phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq | < 3.2.5 |
3.2.5 |
How to fix
Move to the fixed version or later with your package manager, update the lockfile, and run your tests. If the package only arrives through another dependency, upgrade that dependency first. If none of its releases pulls a fixed version yet, force the version with your package manager's override.
phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq Packagist → 3.2.5
- composer
composer require phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq:^3.2.5
Severity breakdown
CVSS 3.1 6.5
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:L
- Attack vector
- Network
- Attack complexity
- Low
- Privileges required
- None
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- None
- Integrity
- Low
- Availability
- Low
Weakness
CWE-863: Incorrect Authorization
The product performs an authorization check when an actor attempts to access a resource or perform an action, but it does not correctly perform the check.
How to prevent it
- Architecture and Design: Divide the product into anonymous, normal, privileged, and administrative areas. Reduce the attack surface by carefully mapping roles with data and functionality. Use role-based access control (RBAC) [REF-229] to enforce the roles at the appropriate boundaries. Note that this approach may not protect against horizontal authorization, i.e., it will not protect a user from attacking others with the same role.
- Architecture and Design: Ensure that access control checks are performed related to the business logic. These checks may be different than the access control checks that are applied to more generic resources such as files, connections, processes, memory, and database records. For example, a database may restrict access for medical records to a specific database user, but each record might only be intended to be accessible to the patient and the patient's doctor [REF-7].
- Architecture and Design: Use a vetted library or framework that does not allow this weakness to occur or provides constructs that make this weakness easier to avoid. For example, consider using authorization frameworks such as the JAAS Authorization Framework [REF-233] and the OWASP ESAPI Access Control feature [REF-45].
- Architecture and Design: For web applications, make sure that the access control mechanism is enforced correctly at the server side on every page. Users should not be able to access any unauthorized functionality or information by simply requesting direct access to that page. One way to do this is to ensure that all pages containing sensitive information are not cached, and that all such pages restrict access to requests that are accompanied by an active and authenticated session token associated with a user who has the required permissions to access that page.
- System Configuration, Installation: Use the access control capabilities of your operating system and server environment and define your access control lists accordingly. Use a "default deny" policy when defining these ACLs.
References
Advisories
Packages
Other links
Timeline
- Published
- Last updated by the source
- Latest EPSS score
Related advisories
| Advisory | Severity | Why it's related |
|---|---|---|
| GHSA-rw77-vq4g-x3hp phpMyFAQ has SQL Injection in `StopWords::add()` — Unescaped Stop Word Insertion | High | Also affects phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq |
| GHSA-8gpw-xvpf-hvx5 phpMyFAQ's two-factor authentication login bypasses the password factor | High | Also affects phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq |
| GHSA-pgwp-vc7q-cvj3 phpMyFAQ has Stored XSS in Admin FAQ Editor via HTML Entity Bypass in Frontend FAQ Submission | High | Also affects phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq |
| GHSA-mf8r-wm2w-f8c5 phpMyFAQ public FAQ APIs expose inactive FAQ content | Medium | Also affects phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq |
| GHSA-88g4-74f3-63x9 phpMyFAQ has Potential Authenticated Path Traversal in PDF Export | Medium | Also affects phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq |
| GHSA-pg62-f8g4-4wqh phpMyFAQ privilege escalation: GroupController::updatePermissions lets a GROUP_EDIT admin grant rights they do not hold | High | Also affects phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq |
| GHSA-985r-q3qp-299h phpMyFAQ has an incomplete fix for GHSA-xvp4-phqj-cjr3 — editUser() and updateUserRights() lack authorization guards | High | Also affects phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq |
| GHSA-8c6h-7g6x-m5x4 phpMyFAQ: Missing userHasPermission() in 4 API write endpoints (CVE-2026-24421 Incomplete Fix) | Medium | Also affects phpmyfaq/phpmyfaq |
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