CVE-2026-30534: Online Food Ordering System SQLi Flaw

CVE-2026-30534 Overview

A SQL Injection vulnerability has been identified in SourceCodester Online Food Ordering System version 1.0. The vulnerability exists in the admin/manage_category.php file and can be exploited through the id parameter. This flaw allows authenticated attackers to inject malicious SQL queries, potentially leading to unauthorized data access, modification, or deletion of database contents.

Critical Impact

Successful exploitation of this SQL Injection vulnerability enables attackers to bypass authentication controls, exfiltrate sensitive data including customer information and credentials, and potentially achieve full database compromise.

Affected Products

• SourceCodester Online Food Ordering System v1.0
• oretnom23 online_food_ordering_system

Discovery Timeline

• 2026-03-27 - CVE CVE-2026-30534 published to NVD
• 2026-03-30 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2026-30534

Vulnerability Analysis

This SQL Injection vulnerability (CWE-89) occurs due to improper neutralization of special characters within the id parameter in the admin/manage_category.php script. The application fails to properly sanitize user-supplied input before incorporating it into SQL queries, allowing attackers to inject arbitrary SQL commands.

The vulnerability requires low-privilege authentication to exploit, as it resides within the administrative section of the application. However, once an attacker gains access to any authenticated session, they can leverage this flaw to extract sensitive information from the database, modify existing records, or potentially escalate their privileges within the system.

Root Cause

The root cause of this vulnerability is insufficient input validation and the lack of parameterized queries (prepared statements) in the manage_category.php file. The id parameter is directly concatenated into SQL queries without proper sanitization or escaping, creating a classic SQL Injection attack surface. This is a common vulnerability pattern in PHP applications that use direct string interpolation for database queries instead of using PDO prepared statements or mysqli parameterized queries.

Attack Vector

The attack is network-based and can be executed remotely by any user with administrative access to the Online Food Ordering System. The attacker crafts a malicious HTTP request to admin/manage_category.php with a specially crafted id parameter containing SQL injection payloads.

The vulnerability allows attackers to:

• Extract data from the database using UNION-based or blind SQL injection techniques
• Modify or delete database records
• Potentially read or write files on the server if database permissions allow
• Enumerate database structure and table contents

Technical details and proof of concept information are available in the GitHub SQLi Proof of Concept repository.

Detection Methods for CVE-2026-30534

Indicators of Compromise

• Unusual SQL syntax or error messages in web server logs referencing manage_category.php
• Multiple requests to admin/manage_category.php with suspicious id parameter values containing SQL keywords such as UNION, SELECT, OR, AND, single quotes, or comment characters (--, #)
• Database query logs showing unexpected queries or authentication bypass attempts
• Unauthorized data access or modifications in the food ordering system database

Detection Strategies

• Implement Web Application Firewall (WAF) rules to detect and block SQL injection patterns in the id parameter
• Monitor HTTP request logs for anomalous patterns targeting admin/manage_category.php
• Deploy database activity monitoring to detect suspicious query patterns
• Use intrusion detection systems (IDS) with SQL injection signature rules

Monitoring Recommendations

• Enable verbose logging on the web server to capture full request parameters
• Set up alerts for SQL error messages appearing in application logs
• Monitor database query execution times for anomalies that may indicate data exfiltration
• Track administrative access patterns for unusual activity

How to Mitigate CVE-2026-30534

Immediate Actions Required

• Restrict access to the administrative panel (/admin/) to trusted IP addresses only
• Implement a Web Application Firewall (WAF) with SQL injection protection rules
• Review and audit all user accounts with administrative access
• Consider taking the application offline until patches can be applied

Patch Information

No official vendor patch has been released at the time of this analysis. As SourceCodester applications are distributed as open-source educational projects, users should implement their own security fixes by modifying the source code to use parameterized queries. The vulnerable manage_category.php file should be updated to use prepared statements with bound parameters for all database interactions involving the id parameter.

Workarounds

• Replace direct SQL string concatenation with PDO prepared statements or mysqli parameterized queries in admin/manage_category.php
• Implement strict input validation to ensure the id parameter contains only numeric values
• Deploy a WAF with SQL injection filtering capabilities in front of the application
• Restrict database user permissions to minimum required privileges (principle of least privilege)

# Configuration example - Apache .htaccess to restrict admin access by IP
<Directory "/var/www/html/admin">
    Order Deny,Allow
    Deny from all
    Allow from 192.168.1.0/24
    Allow from 10.0.0.0/8
</Directory>