CVE-2023-42452

Mastodon vulnerable to Stored XSS through the translation feature

Published Sep 19, 2023 CVSS 3.1 · 6.1 Medium EPSS < 1% KEV · Not listed
Description
Mastodon is a free, open-source social network server based on ActivityPub. In versions on the 4.x branch prior to versions 4.0.10, 4.2.8, and 4.2.0-rc2, under certain conditions, attackers can abuse the translation feature to bypass the server-side HTML sanitization, allowing unescaped HTML to execute in the browser. The impact is limited thanks to Mastodon's strict Content Security Policy, blocking inline scripts, etc. However a CSP bypass or loophole could be exploited to execute malicious XSS. Furthermore, it requires user interaction, as this can only occur upon clicking the “Translate” button on a malicious post. Versions 4.0.10, 4.2.8, and 4.2.0-rc2 contain a patch for this issue.

Remediation

No solution or workaround provided in the CVE record

Tracking

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Advisories

Source ID Title
EUVD EUVD EUVD-2023-46898 Mastodon is a free, open-source social network server based on ActivityPub. In versions on the 4.x branch prior to versions 4.0.10, 4.2.8, and 4.2.0-rc2, under certain conditions, attackers can abuse the translation feature to bypass the server-side HTML sanitization, allowing unescaped HTML to execute in the browser. The impact is limited thanks to Mastodon's strict Content Security Policy, blocking inline scripts, etc. However a CSP bypass or loophole could be exploited to execute malicious XSS. Furthermore, it requires user interaction, as this can only occur upon clicking the “Translate” button on a malicious post. Versions 4.0.10, 4.2.8, and 4.2.0-rc2 contain a patch for this issue.
History
Type Values Removed Values Added
Metrics ssvc

{'options': {'Automatable': 'no', 'Exploitation': 'none', 'Technical Impact': 'partial'}, 'version': '2.0.3'}

Weaknesses

Sources

Status
PUBLISHED
Assigner
GitHub_M
Published
Updated
Sep 24, 2024, 6:11 PM
Reserved
Sep 8, 2023, 8:57 PM
Status
Modified
Published
Sep 19, 2023, 4:15 PM
Modified
Jun 17, 2026, 6:23 AM