CVE-2023-35159
Published: 23 June 2023
Summary
CVE-2023-35159 is a critical-severity Improper Neutralization of Alternate XSS Syntax (CWE-87) vulnerability in Xwiki Xwiki. Its CVSS base score is 9.6 (Critical).
Operationally, ranked in the top 10.9% of CVEs by exploit likelihood; it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
Deeper analysis
XWiki Platform, a generic wiki platform, contains a reflected cross-site scripting vulnerability in its deletespace template that permits JavaScript injection through a crafted URL parameter such as xredirect=javascript:alert(document.domain). The flaw has existed since version 3.4-milestone-1 and is tracked under CWE-79 and CWE-87.
An unauthenticated remote attacker can exploit the issue by supplying a malicious link that a victim user follows, resulting in arbitrary script execution in the victim's browser context. Successful exploitation can lead to theft of session data, account takeover, or other actions with high impact on confidentiality, integrity, and availability, as reflected in the CVSS 9.6 score.
Advisories and patches indicate that the vulnerability is resolved in XWiki 14.10.5 and 15.1-rc-1; the referenced GitHub commits, GHSA-x234-mg7q-m8g8, and associated JIRA tickets XWIKI-20583 and XWIKI-20612 provide the remediation details and upgrade guidance.
The EPSS score rose materially from a low baseline to a peak of 0.3788 on 2025-01-22 before receding to the current value of 0.0428, indicating that exploitation interest emerged after public disclosure.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2023-1908
Vulnerability details
XWiki Platform is a generic wiki platform offering runtime services for applications built on top of it. Users are able to forge an URL with a payload allowing to inject Javascript in the page (XSS). It's possible to exploit the…
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deletespace template to perform a XSS, e.g. by using URL such as: > xwiki/bin/deletespace/Sandbox/?xredirect=javascript:alert(document.domain). This vulnerability exists since XWiki 3.4-milestone-1. The vulnerability has been patched in XWiki 14.10.5 and 15.1-rc-1.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
No named actor attribution yet. ATT&CK technique mapping in progress for this CVE.
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
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.
Penetration testing submits XSS payloads to web applications, detecting cross-site scripting flaws for subsequent remediation.
Validates web inputs to reject script-related content that could produce XSS.
Output validation against expected content can reject or sanitize script content in generated web pages, reducing XSS exploitability.