CVE-2026-7117: Employee Management System SQLi Vulnerability

CVE-2026-7117 Overview

A SQL Injection vulnerability has been identified in code-projects Employee Management System 1.0. The vulnerability exists in an unknown function of the file 370project/approve.php. By manipulating the id or token argument parameters, an attacker can inject malicious SQL commands. This vulnerability is exploitable remotely, and exploit information has been made publicly available, increasing the risk of active exploitation.

Critical Impact

Successful exploitation of this SQL Injection vulnerability could allow attackers to read, modify, or delete database contents, potentially compromising employee data, authentication credentials, and sensitive organizational information stored in the system.

Affected Products

• code-projects Employee Management System 1.0
• 370project/approve.php component

Discovery Timeline

• 2026-04-27 - CVE-2026-7117 published to NVD
• 2026-04-29 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2026-7117

Vulnerability Analysis

This vulnerability is classified as CWE-74 (Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component), which encompasses injection vulnerabilities including SQL Injection. The affected endpoint 370project/approve.php fails to properly sanitize user-supplied input through the id and token parameters before incorporating them into SQL queries.

The lack of input validation and parameterized queries allows attackers to craft malicious payloads that can manipulate the underlying database queries. Since this is an employee management system, the database likely contains sensitive personnel information, making this vulnerability particularly concerning from a data protection standpoint.

Root Cause

The root cause of this vulnerability is improper input validation and lack of parameterized queries in the approve.php file. The application directly concatenates user-supplied values from the id and token parameters into SQL statements without proper sanitization or the use of prepared statements. This allows attackers to break out of the intended query structure and inject arbitrary SQL commands.

Attack Vector

The attack can be executed remotely over the network. An authenticated attacker with low privileges can exploit this vulnerability by sending crafted HTTP requests to the 370project/approve.php endpoint with malicious SQL payloads in the id or token parameters. The vulnerability requires no user interaction and can be exploited against any accessible instance of the Employee Management System.

The attack flow typically involves:

1. Identifying the vulnerable endpoint at 370project/approve.php
2. Crafting SQL injection payloads targeting the id or token parameters
3. Submitting requests with malicious payloads to extract or manipulate database contents
4. Potentially escalating access by retrieving authentication credentials from the database

For technical details on the exploitation mechanism, see the GitHub CVE Documentation.

Detection Methods for CVE-2026-7117

Indicators of Compromise

• Unusual HTTP requests to 370project/approve.php containing SQL syntax characters such as single quotes, double dashes, UNION, SELECT, or OR 1=1
• Database error messages appearing in application logs or HTTP responses
• Anomalous database query patterns or unexpected data access events
• Evidence of data exfiltration or unauthorized database modifications

Detection Strategies

• Implement Web Application Firewall (WAF) rules to detect SQL injection patterns in the id and token parameters
• Monitor HTTP access logs for requests to approve.php with suspicious query string patterns
• Enable database query logging and alert on queries containing injection signatures
• Deploy SentinelOne Singularity to detect and block exploitation attempts through behavioral analysis

Monitoring Recommendations

• Configure alerts for repeated failed or anomalous requests to the approve.php endpoint
• Monitor database audit logs for unusual query patterns or unauthorized data access
• Implement real-time log correlation to identify attack campaigns targeting this vulnerability
• Review network traffic for data exfiltration attempts following potential exploitation

How to Mitigate CVE-2026-7117

Immediate Actions Required

• Restrict access to the 370project/approve.php endpoint to trusted IP addresses or internal networks only
• Implement input validation on the id and token parameters to allow only expected character sets
• Deploy Web Application Firewall (WAF) rules to block SQL injection attempts
• Consider disabling the affected functionality until a permanent fix is applied

Patch Information

No official patch information is currently available from the vendor. Organizations should monitor the Code Projects Resource Hub for security updates. In the absence of a vendor patch, implementing the recommended workarounds and defense-in-depth measures is critical.

Additional vulnerability details can be found at VulDB Vulnerability #359717.

Workarounds

• Implement parameterized queries (prepared statements) in the affected approve.php file to prevent SQL injection
• Add input validation to sanitize the id and token parameters, accepting only alphanumeric characters where appropriate
• Deploy a Web Application Firewall with SQL injection detection capabilities in front of the application
• Apply the principle of least privilege to the database account used by the application to minimize potential damage

# Example: Restricting access to the vulnerable endpoint via Apache .htaccess
# Add to .htaccess file in the 370project directory
<Files "approve.php">
    Order Deny,Allow
    Deny from all
    Allow from 10.0.0.0/8
    Allow from 192.168.0.0/16
</Files>