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ActiveAdmin CSV Injection leading to sensitive information disclosure

Moderate severity GitHub Reviewed Published Dec 27, 2023 in activeadmin/activeadmin • Updated Dec 28, 2023

Package

bundler activeadmin (RubyGems)

Affected versions

< 3.2.0

Patched versions

3.2.0

Description

Impact

In ActiveAdmin versions prior to 3.2.0, maliciously crafted spreadsheet formulas could be uploaded as part of admin data that, when exported to a CSV file and the imported to a spreadsheet program like libreoffice, could lead to remote code execution and private data exfiltration.

The attacker would need privileges to upload data to the same ActiveAdmin application as the victim, and would need the victim to possibly ignore security warnings from their spreadsheet program.

Patches

Versions 3.2.0 and above fixed the problem by escaping any data starting with = and other characters used by spreadsheet programs.

Workarounds

Only turn on formula evaluation in spreadsheet programs when importing CSV after explicitly reviewing the file.

References

https://owasp.org/www-community/attacks/CSV_Injection
activeadmin/activeadmin#8167

References

@deivid-rodriguez deivid-rodriguez published to activeadmin/activeadmin Dec 27, 2023
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Dec 28, 2023
Reviewed Dec 28, 2023
Last updated Dec 28, 2023

Severity

Moderate

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Local
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
High
User interaction
Required
Scope
Changed
Confidentiality
Low
Integrity
Low
Availability
Low

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:R/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:L

EPSS score

0.073%
(33rd percentile)

Weaknesses

CVE ID

CVE-2023-51763

GHSA ID

GHSA-xhvv-3jww-c487

Source code

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