[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #31663: wp-login.php - Cannot modify header information

WordPress Trac noreply at wordpress.org
Tue Mar 17 08:42:53 UTC 2015


#31663: wp-login.php - Cannot modify header information
------------------------------------+-----------------------------
 Reporter:  cashbox0815             |      Owner:
     Type:  defect (bug)            |     Status:  new
 Priority:  normal                  |  Milestone:  Awaiting Review
Component:  Login and Registration  |    Version:  4.1.1
 Severity:  normal                  |   Keywords:
  Focuses:                          |
------------------------------------+-----------------------------
 AFFECTED PRODUCTS:
 ----------------------------
 WordPress 4.1.1 and prior

 DETAILS:
 ----------------------------
 The WordPress Login Controller is prone to a full path disclosure
 vulnerability concerning the strpos() php function which allow attackers
 to
 gather the real path of the server side script.

 The strpos() PHP function takes strings as parameters
 and will raise warnings when values that are passed are arrays rather
 then strings. To get the path of the current script, you simply need to
 pass the
 arguments as arrays rather then expected strings
 and then simply read the warning message generated by PHP to see the
 error including the full path of the current running script.

 PROOF OF CONCEPT:
 ----------------------------
 http://pathtoyourwordpress.tld/wp-
 login.php?redirect_to[]=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.secalert.net%2Fwp-
 admin%2F&reauth=1

 Output:
 Warning: strpos() expects parameter 1 to be string, array given in
 /var/www/clients/0815/websites/www/wp-login.php on line 849

 Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by
 (output started at var/www/clients/0815/websites/www/wp-login.php:849) in
 var/www/clients/0815/websites/www/wp-includes/pluggable.php on line 940

 WRONG SOLUTION:
 ----------------------------
 I would NOT recommend to just react by "security through obscurity" and
 turn off the error messages, error reporting etc.
 This is not a solution because there are a lot of users that are having
 a shared hosting server where they aren't able to manipulate
 the "php.ini" configuration file - even ini_set() is forbidden on some
 shared hoster servers.
 So they still would have the full path disclosure there which is something
 that the web application should catch if quality is important.

 WORKAROUND:
 ----------------------------
 I would recommend to meticulously go through the code forcing PHP to
 cast the data to the desired type, in this case the (string) casts
 to eliminate the Notice or Warning messages.

--
Ticket URL: <https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/31663>
WordPress Trac <https://core.trac.wordpress.org/>
WordPress publishing platform


More information about the wp-trac mailing list