CVE-2024-2351: Codeastro Ecommerce Site SQLi Vulnerability

CVE-2024-2351 Overview

A critical SQL injection vulnerability has been discovered in CodeAstro Ecommerce Site version 1.0. This vulnerability exists in the action.php file within the Search component, where the cat_id, brand_id, and keyword parameters are improperly handled, allowing attackers to inject malicious SQL queries. The vulnerability can be exploited remotely without authentication, potentially leading to complete database compromise including unauthorized data access, modification, and deletion.

Critical Impact

This SQL injection vulnerability allows unauthenticated remote attackers to execute arbitrary SQL commands against the backend database, potentially exposing sensitive customer data, payment information, and administrative credentials stored in the ecommerce platform.

Affected Products

• CodeAstro Ecommerce Website 1.0

Discovery Timeline

• March 9, 2024 - CVE-2024-2351 published to NVD
• February 26, 2025 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2024-2351

Vulnerability Analysis

This SQL injection vulnerability affects the Search functionality of the CodeAstro Ecommerce Site, specifically within the action.php file. The vulnerability arises from insufficient input validation and sanitization of user-supplied data in the search parameters. When processing search requests, the application directly incorporates the cat_id, brand_id, and keyword parameters into SQL queries without proper sanitization or parameterized query implementation.

The vulnerability allows attackers to manipulate the database query structure by injecting specially crafted SQL syntax through these vulnerable parameters. Since authentication is not required, any remote attacker can exploit this vulnerability to extract sensitive data, bypass authentication mechanisms, modify or delete database records, and potentially achieve further system compromise depending on database permissions.

Root Cause

The root cause of this vulnerability is improper input validation and the lack of prepared statements or parameterized queries in the action.php search functionality. The application directly concatenates user-supplied input from the cat_id, brand_id, and keyword parameters into SQL query strings. This classic injection pattern occurs when developers fail to implement proper input sanitization techniques such as escaping special characters, validating input types, or using parameterized queries that separate SQL logic from user data.

Attack Vector

The attack can be launched remotely over the network without any authentication requirements or user interaction. An attacker targets the Search component by sending crafted HTTP requests to action.php with malicious SQL payloads in the cat_id, brand_id, or keyword parameters.

Typical exploitation scenarios include:

• Injecting UNION-based payloads to extract data from other database tables
• Using boolean-based or time-based blind SQL injection to enumerate database contents
• Leveraging stacked queries (if supported) to modify or delete data
• Extracting administrator credentials to gain authenticated access

The exploit details have been disclosed publicly through external references, increasing the risk of active exploitation. For technical details, see the VulDB advisory.

Detection Methods for CVE-2024-2351

Indicators of Compromise

• Unusual SQL error messages appearing in web server logs or responses
• HTTP requests to action.php containing SQL keywords such as UNION, SELECT, DROP, --, or encoded variants in the cat_id, brand_id, or keyword parameters
• Abnormal database query patterns or unexpected database connections from the web application
• Evidence of data exfiltration or unauthorized database modifications

Detection Strategies

• Implement Web Application Firewall (WAF) rules to detect and block common SQL injection patterns in request parameters
• Configure application logging to capture all requests to action.php with detailed parameter logging
• Deploy database activity monitoring to identify suspicious query patterns, including unauthorized SELECT statements against sensitive tables
• Utilize SIEM solutions to correlate web access logs with database query logs for anomaly detection

Monitoring Recommendations

• Monitor web server access logs for requests to action.php containing suspicious characters or SQL keywords
• Enable database query logging and alert on queries containing multiple table references or administrative operations
• Implement rate limiting on search functionality to slow down automated exploitation attempts
• Set up alerts for failed login attempts that may indicate credential harvesting via SQL injection

How to Mitigate CVE-2024-2351

Immediate Actions Required

• Restrict access to the affected action.php search functionality until a patch is applied
• Implement input validation at the web application firewall level to block requests containing SQL injection patterns
• Review and restrict database user permissions for the ecommerce application to limit potential impact
• Enable enhanced logging on the web application and database to detect exploitation attempts

Patch Information

No official vendor patch information is currently available for this vulnerability. Organizations using CodeAstro Ecommerce Site 1.0 should contact the vendor for remediation guidance. In the absence of an official fix, implementing the workarounds and mitigations described below is essential.

For additional technical details and tracking information, refer to the VulDB vulnerability database entry.

Workarounds

• Deploy a Web Application Firewall (WAF) configured with SQL injection detection rules to filter malicious requests before they reach the application
• Modify the action.php file to implement prepared statements with parameterized queries for all database interactions involving the cat_id, brand_id, and keyword parameters
• Add server-side input validation to ensure cat_id and brand_id contain only integer values, and sanitize the keyword parameter to allow only alphanumeric characters and safe search terms
• Consider taking the search functionality offline temporarily if the ecommerce site handles sensitive customer data and cannot be adequately protected

# Example WAF rule for ModSecurity to block SQL injection attempts
SecRule ARGS:cat_id|ARGS:brand_id|ARGS:keyword "@detectSQLi" \
    "id:1001,\
    phase:2,\
    deny,\
    status:403,\
    log,\
    msg:'SQL Injection attempt detected in search parameters',\
    tag:'CVE-2024-2351'"