CVE-2023-50723: Remote code execution/programming rights with configuration section from any user account

Should you act?

Critical, preconditions apply

Severe if exploited, but exploitation needs conditions that may not apply to you. This signal is computed from CISA KEV, EPSS and CVSS data; it is not an editorial verdict.

• No confirmed exploitation. It is not in CISA’s KEV catalog and CISA’s SSVC assessment records no known exploitation. That can change quickly after a public write-up; re-check if you are affected.
• EPSS 1.2%, percentile 68: FIRST’s model estimates a 1.2% chance of exploitation activity in the next 30 days, higher than 68% of all scored CVEs (moderate). EPSS is a probability, not a verdict.
• Needs an account (low (any account)). Exposure depends on who can log in.
• Only applies if your dependency tree includes org.xwiki.platform:xwiki-platform-administration-ui (Maven) >= 2.3, < 14.10.15, fixed in 14.10.15; org.xwiki.platform:xwiki-platform-administration-ui (Maven) >= 15.0-rc-1, < 15.5.2, fixed in 15.5.2; org.xwiki.platform:xwiki-platform-administration-ui (Maven) >= 15.6-rc-1, < 15.7-rc-1, fixed in 15.7-rc-1. Check your lockfile, including transitive dependencies.

What it is

XWiki Platform is a generic wiki platform. Starting in 2.3 and prior to versions 14.10.15, 15.5.2, and 15.7-rc-1, anyone who can edit an arbitrary wiki page in an XWiki installation can gain programming right through several cases of missing escaping in the code for displaying sections in the administration interface. This impacts the confidentiality, integrity and availability of the whole XWiki installation. Normally, all users are allowed to edit their own user profile so this should be exploitable by all users of the XWiki instance. This has been fixed in XWiki 14.10.15, 15.5.2 and 15.7RC1. The patches can be manually applied to the XWiki.ConfigurableClassMacros and XWiki.ConfigurableClass pages.

From the GitHub advisory

Impact

Anyone who can edit an arbitrary wiki page in an XWiki installation can gain programming right through several cases of missing escaping in the code for displaying sections in the administration interface. This impacts the confidentiality, integrity and availability of the whole XWiki installation. Normally, all users are allowed to edit their own user profile so this should be exploitable by all users of the XWiki instance.

The easiest way to reproduce this is to edit any document with the object editor and add an object of type XWiki.ConfigurableClass ("Custom configurable sections"). Set "Display in section" and "Display in Category" to "other", set scope to "Wiki and all spaces" and "Heading" to {{async}}{{groovy}}services.logging.getLogger("attacker").error("Attack from Heading succeeded!"); println("Hello from Groovy!"){{/groovy}}{{/async}}. Click "Save". Open /xwiki/bin/view/Main/?sheet=XWiki.AdminSheet&viewer=content&editor=globaladmin&section=other where is the URL of your XWiki installation. If this displays just "Hello from Groovy!" in a heading and generates an error message with content "Attack from Heading succeeded!" in XWiki's log, the attack succeeded. Similar attacks are also possible by creating this kind of object on a document with a specially crafted name, see the referenced Jira issues for more reproduction steps.

Patches This has been fixed in XWiki 14.10.15, 15.5.2 and 15.7RC1

Workarounds

Weakness type: CWE-95, CWE-94.

Product: org.xwiki.platform:xwiki-platform-administration-ui (Maven) · Assigned by: GitHub_M · Published: 2023-12-15

Affected and fixed versions

Severity scores

• Attack vector: network (remotely reachable)
• Attack complexity: low
• Privileges required: low (any account)
• User interaction: none
• Scope: changed (can affect other components)

CVSS measures how bad a flaw is if exploited, not how likely exploitation is. Read it next to the exploitation data below.

Exploitation and urgency

• CISA KEV: not listed (no confirmed in-the-wild exploitation known to CISA).
• CISA SSVC assessment: exploitation none, automatable no, technical impact total.
• FIRST EPSS (model of 2026-10-21): 1.19% probability of exploitation activity in the next 30 days; percentile 68.

Timeline

• 2023-12-15 — CVE record published by GitHub_M
• 2023-12-16 — GitHub-reviewed advisory GHSA-qj86-p74r-7wp5 published (critical)
• 2025-05-07 — CVE record last updated

Sources and references

Original sources first. Version and fix details should always be confirmed against the vendor or project advisory.

Vulnerability records

1. GitHub Advisory GHSA-qj86-p74r-7wp5 github.com
2. CVE.org record CVE-2023-50723 cve.org
3. NVD entry CVE-2023-50723 nvd.nist.gov

Other references from the CVE record and advisory

1. github.com github.com
2. github.com github.com
3. github.com github.com
4. github.com github.com
5. github.com github.com
6. jira.xwiki.org jira.xwiki.org
7. jira.xwiki.org jira.xwiki.org
8. jira.xwiki.org jira.xwiki.org

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