(PT-2013-63) Positive Technologies Security Advisory
Hash Length Extension in HTMLPurifier
Vulnerable software
HTMLPurifier
Version: 4.5.0 and earlier
Link:
http://htmlpurifier.org/
Severity level
Severity level: Medium
Impact: Signature Forgery, Arbitrary Value Injection into Signed Data
Access Vector: Remote
CVSS v2:
Base Score: 5.0
Vector: (AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:N)
CVE: not assigned
Software description
HTML Purifier is a standards-compliant HTML filter library written in PHP.
Vulnerability description
The specialists of the Positive Research center have detected a vulnerability in HTMLPurifier that allows attackers to carry out a "Hash Length Extension" attack..
Class HTMLPurifier_URIFilter_Munge implements a URI filter that replaces all links with a formatted URL, for example, it can be used to rewrite links to pass them into redirection script. To prevent links from being altered HTMLPurifier allows specifying a secret key via "URI.MungeSecretKey" configuration directive. However, this signature generation method is susceptible to a hash length extension attack.
The vulnerability allows attackers to append an arbitrary value to the signed data without knowing the secret key. This may cause other vulnerabilities in the web applications, which use signature generated by HTMLPurifier to keep the links from being altered.
How to fix
Update your software up to the latest version
Advisory status
03.09.2013 - Vendor gets vulnerability details
30.11.2013 - Vendor releases fixed version and details
04.12.2013 - Public disclosure
Credits
The vulnerability was detected by Arseny Reutov, Positive Research Center (Positive Technologies Company)
References
http://en.securitylab.ru/lab/PT-2013-63
Reports on the vulnerabilities previously discovered by Positive Research:
http://www.ptsecurity.com/research/advisory/
http://en.securitylab.ru/lab/
About Positive Technologies
Positive Technologies www.ptsecurity.com is among the key players in the IT security market in Russia.
The principal activities of the company include the development of integrated tools for information security monitoring (MaxPatrol); providing IT security consulting services and technical support; development of the Securitylab leading Russian information security portal.
Among the clients of Positive Technologies, there are more than 40 state enterprises, more than 50 banks and financial organizations, 20 telecommunication companies, more than 40 plant facilities, as well as IT, service and retail companies from Russia, the CIS countries, the Baltic States, China, Ecuador, Germany, Great Britain, Holland, Iran, Israel, Japan, Mexico, the Republic of South Africa, Thailand, Turkey, and the USA.
Positive Technologies is a team of highly skilled developers, advisers and experts with years of vast hands-on experience. The company specialists possess professional titles and certificates; they are the members of various international societies and are actively involved in the IT security field development.
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