CVE-2025-2059: Phpgurukul Ambulance Portal SQLi Flaw

CVE-2025-2059 Overview

A SQL injection vulnerability has been identified in PHPGurukul Emergency Ambulance Hiring Portal version 1.0. This vulnerability exists in the /admin/booking-details.php file, where the ambulanceregnum parameter is not properly sanitized before being used in database queries. This flaw allows remote attackers to manipulate SQL queries by injecting malicious input, potentially leading to unauthorized data access, modification, or deletion.

Critical Impact

Remote attackers can exploit this SQL injection vulnerability to bypass authentication, exfiltrate sensitive data including booking records and user information, or potentially gain unauthorized administrative access to the emergency ambulance hiring portal.

Affected Products

• PHPGurukul Emergency Ambulance Hiring Portal 1.0

Discovery Timeline

• 2025-03-07 - CVE-2025-2059 published to NVD
• 2025-05-21 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2025-2059

Vulnerability Analysis

The vulnerability resides in the administrative section of the Emergency Ambulance Hiring Portal, specifically within the /admin/booking-details.php endpoint. The application fails to implement proper input validation and parameterized queries when processing the ambulanceregnum parameter. This parameter, which appears to be used for looking up booking details by ambulance registration number, is directly concatenated into SQL queries without sanitization.

The network-accessible attack vector allows exploitation without requiring any user interaction or prior authentication in some scenarios. The vulnerability has been classified under CWE-89 (Improper Neutralization of Special Elements used in an SQL Command) and CWE-74 (Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component).

Root Cause

The root cause of this vulnerability is the lack of prepared statements or parameterized queries in the PHP codebase. When user-supplied input from the ambulanceregnum parameter is incorporated directly into SQL queries using string concatenation, attackers can manipulate the query logic by injecting SQL syntax characters and commands. This is a fundamental secure coding violation that has been well-documented for decades.

Attack Vector

The vulnerability can be exploited remotely over the network. An attacker can craft malicious HTTP requests to the /admin/booking-details.php endpoint with specially crafted SQL injection payloads in the ambulanceregnum parameter. The exploit has been publicly disclosed, making it accessible to potential attackers. The attack requires no authentication credentials and no user interaction, as the vulnerable parameter accepts direct manipulation.

Typical attack scenarios include:

• Authentication Bypass: Using SQL injection techniques like ' OR '1'='1 to bypass login checks
• Data Exfiltration: Employing UNION-based injection to extract data from other database tables
• Database Enumeration: Using error-based or blind SQL injection techniques to map the database structure

Detection Methods for CVE-2025-2059

Indicators of Compromise

• Unusual SQL syntax patterns in web server access logs for /admin/booking-details.php
• Presence of SQL injection payloads (e.g., ' OR, UNION SELECT, --, /**/) in the ambulanceregnum parameter values
• Abnormal database query execution times indicating blind SQL injection attempts
• Unauthorized data access or modifications in booking records

Detection Strategies

• Implement Web Application Firewall (WAF) rules to detect and block SQL injection patterns targeting the ambulanceregnum parameter
• Monitor application logs for repeated requests to /admin/booking-details.php with suspicious parameter values
• Deploy database activity monitoring to identify abnormal query patterns or unauthorized data access
• Use intrusion detection systems (IDS) with SQL injection signature rules

Monitoring Recommendations

• Enable detailed logging for all requests to the administrative interface, particularly /admin/booking-details.php
• Configure alerts for HTTP requests containing common SQL injection keywords and special characters
• Monitor database query logs for syntax errors or unusual queries originating from the web application
• Establish baseline behavior patterns for the admin portal and alert on deviations

How to Mitigate CVE-2025-2059

Immediate Actions Required

• Restrict access to the /admin/booking-details.php endpoint to trusted IP addresses only
• Implement a Web Application Firewall (WAF) with SQL injection protection rules
• Disable the vulnerable endpoint if immediate patching is not possible
• Review database user privileges and implement least-privilege principles

Patch Information

At the time of publication, no official patch has been released by PHPGurukul for this vulnerability. Organizations using the Emergency Ambulance Hiring Portal should monitor the PHP Gurukul Homepage for security updates and patches. Additional details about this vulnerability can be found in the GitHub Issue for CVE and the VulDB Report #298814.

Workarounds

• Implement input validation using allowlists for the ambulanceregnum parameter, accepting only alphanumeric characters
• Modify the vulnerable PHP code to use prepared statements with PDO or MySQLi parameterized queries
• Deploy a reverse proxy or WAF to filter malicious requests before they reach the application
• Consider network segmentation to isolate the application from sensitive systems until a patch is available

# Example WAF rule configuration (ModSecurity)
SecRule ARGS:ambulanceregnum "@rx (\%27)|(\')|(\-\-)|(\%23)|(#)" \
    "id:1001,phase:2,deny,status:403,msg:'SQL Injection Attempt Blocked in ambulanceregnum'"