Security Resilience

CVE-2023-29202

XSS in Xwiki 1.8 – 14.5

Public PoCXSS
Published
15 April 2023
Modified
21 November 2024
Patch / advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 9.0
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H
EPSS Score 0.014 72th percentile
Risk Priority 72 floored blend · peak EPSS

CVSS and EPSS are reproduced from their sources (NVD, FIRST EPSS). Risk Priority is our own derived reading, not an NVD score.

Summary

CVE-2023-29202 is a critical-severity Cross-site Scripting (CWE-79) vulnerability in Xwiki Xwiki. Its CVSS base score is 9.0 (Critical).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Protocol or Service Impersonation (T1001.003); ranked in the top 28% of CVEs by exploit likelihood; it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog; a public proof-of-concept is referenced.

Deeper analysis AI-assisted summary

Synthesised by an AI model from the NVD description and linked references — a reading aid, not an authoritative source.

The vulnerability is a stored cross-site scripting flaw (CWE-79) in the RSS macro bundled with XWiki Commons. When the macro parameter "content" is set to "true", feed item content is rendered directly into HTML output without sanitization, permitting arbitrary script injection. The affected component is the rendering-macro-rss JAR present in XWiki installations prior to the 14.6 release line.

An attacker able to supply or control an RSS feed URL can embed malicious JavaScript. When a user with programming rights subsequently views the rendered page, the script executes in that user's context, enabling privilege escalation, remote code execution, content modification, or data exfiltration within the wiki.

Advisories and patches indicate the issue was resolved in XWiki 14.6 RC1 by adding proper content cleaning before display. As a temporary mitigation, administrators can remove the macro entirely by deleting WEB-INF/lib/xwiki-platform-rendering-macro-rss-XX.jar from the deployed web application.

The EPSS score remains flat at 0.1102 with no material increase after disclosure.

OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

XWiki Commons are technical libraries common to several other top level XWiki projects. The RSS macro that is bundled in XWiki included the content of the feed items without any cleaning in the HTML output when the parameter `content` was…

more

set to `true`. This allowed arbitrary HTML and in particular also JavaScript injection and thus cross-site scripting (XSS) by specifying an RSS feed with malicious content. With the interaction of a user with programming rights, this could be used to execute arbitrary actions in the wiki, including privilege escalation, remote code execution, information disclosure, modifying or deleting content and sabotaging the wiki. The issue has been patched in XWiki 14.6 RC1, the content of the feed is now properly cleaned before being displayed. As a workaround, if the RSS macro isn't used in the wiki, the macro can be uninstalled by deleting `WEB-INF/lib/xwiki-platform-rendering-macro-rss-XX.jar`, where `XX` is XWiki's version, in the web application's directory.

CWE(s)

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1001.003 Protocol or Service Impersonation Command And Control
Adversaries may impersonate legitimate protocols or web service traffic to disguise command and control activity and thwart analysis efforts.
T1003.004 LSA Secrets Credential Access
Adversaries with SYSTEM access to a host may attempt to access Local Security Authority (LSA) secrets, which can contain a variety of different credential materials, such as credentials for service accounts.
T1003.005 Cached Domain Credentials Credential Access
Adversaries may attempt to access cached domain credentials used to allow authentication to occur in the event a domain controller is unavailable.
T1007 System Service Discovery Discovery
Adversaries may try to gather information about registered local system services.
T1011 Exfiltration Over Other Network Medium Exfiltration
Adversaries may attempt to exfiltrate data over a different network medium than the command and control channel.
T1012 Query Registry Discovery
Adversaries may interact with the Windows Registry to gather information about the system, configuration, and installed software.
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2023-29205Same product: Xwiki Xwiki
CVE-2023-46732Same product: Xwiki Xwiki
CVE-2023-29201Same product: Xwiki Xwiki
CVE-2023-29206Same product: Xwiki Xwiki
CVE-2023-29515Same product: Xwiki Xwiki
CVE-2023-29506Same product: Xwiki Xwiki
CVE-2022-36098Same product: Xwiki Xwiki
CVE-2023-26480Same product: Xwiki Xwiki
CVE-2023-40176Same product: Xwiki Xwiki
CVE-2023-35162Same product: Xwiki Xwiki

Affected Assets

xwiki
xwiki
1.8 · 1.8 — 14.5

Mitigating Controls

Control response

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53)

—

Detect
Catch it (NIST detect / respond)

—

Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)

—

Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)
  • V1.1.2
  • V1.3.2

Likely Mitigating Controls AI

Per-CVE control mapping for this CVE has not run yet; the list below is derived from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry.

addresses: CWE-79

Penetration testing submits XSS payloads to web applications, detecting cross-site scripting flaws for subsequent remediation.

addresses: CWE-79

Validates web inputs to reject script-related content that could produce XSS.

addresses: CWE-79

Output validation against expected content can reject or sanitize script content in generated web pages, reducing XSS exploitability.

Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

PR.PS-06 mostly match
blocks

Secure SDLC practices directly target introduction of XSS via coding standards/testing (mostly), yet the single broad outcome leaves many specific neutralization vectors unaddressed (partial).

PR.PS-02 partial match
blocks

Patching and EOL replacement can remediate known XSS instances in libraries or frameworks (partial) but do nothing to enforce input neutralization in application code (none).

Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

removes
removes
removes
removes
blocks

A.5.6 only promotes membership in groups to improve knowledge, receive alerts, and share information; it performs no action that stops XSS exploitation (or even the underlying neutralization defect) and is a pure dependency for other controls per the owner's labeling rule.

References