CVE-2026-94042: Restaurant Management System SQL Injection

CVE-2026-94042 Overview

CVE-2026-94042 is a SQL injection vulnerability in the AdithyaYelloju Restaurant Management System, affecting commits up to 7f0e7e84255e8fcfd488e83f8f91451bbbff6b9c. The flaw resides in the mysqli_query function call within admin/add_table.php. Attackers can manipulate the table, members, or price arguments to inject arbitrary SQL statements. The project uses a rolling-release model, so no discrete affected or fixed version identifiers exist. The exploit is publicly available, and the maintainer has not responded to the disclosure issue. The vulnerability is classified under [CWE-74] (Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component).

Critical Impact
Authenticated remote attackers can inject SQL statements through the administrative table-management endpoint, exposing restaurant application data to disclosure and tampering.

Affected Products

AdithyaYelloju Restaurant Management System (rolling release)
Codebase up to commit 7f0e7e84255e8fcfd488e83f8f91451bbbff6b9c
The admin/add_table.php endpoint specifically

Discovery Timeline

2026-09-20 - CVE-2026-94042 published to NVD
2026-09-22 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2026-94042

Vulnerability Analysis

The vulnerability exists in admin/add_table.php, which handles administrative table creation for the Restaurant Management System. User-supplied values for table, members, and price are concatenated directly into a SQL statement passed to mysqli_query. Because the code performs no parameterization or escaping, an attacker can break out of the intended query context and append arbitrary SQL. Exploitation requires network access and low-privileged authentication to reach the administrative interface. Successful injection can lead to unauthorized data reads, record modification, and enumeration of the underlying MySQL schema. The maintainer acknowledged the report via GitHub issue tracking but has not shipped a fix, and the rolling-release model means downstream deployments remain exposed until they patch manually.

Root Cause

The root cause is the concatenation of untrusted request parameters into a SQL query string without the use of prepared statements. The mysqli_query call receives a query built from raw POST or GET input, violating the separation between code and data required by [CWE-74].

Attack Vector

An authenticated user with access to the admin interface submits a crafted request to admin/add_table.php, embedding SQL metacharacters in the table, members, or price field. The injected payload executes with the privileges of the database account used by the application. Public exploit details are available through the VulDB Vulnerability Report and the GitHub Issue Discussion. No verified exploit code is reproduced here; refer to the linked references for technical proof-of-concept details.

Detection Methods for CVE-2026-94042

Indicators of Compromise

HTTP POST or GET requests to admin/add_table.php containing SQL metacharacters such as single quotes, UNION, SELECT, --, or /* in the table, members, or price parameters.
Unexpected MySQL error messages or 500 responses generated by mysqli_query when processing table-creation requests.
New administrative sessions originating from unusual IP addresses immediately followed by requests to admin/add_table.php.

Detection Strategies

Deploy web application firewall (WAF) rules that inspect requests to admin/* endpoints for SQL injection payload patterns.
Enable MySQL general query logging in non-production environments to capture malformed queries containing injected clauses.
Correlate authentication events with subsequent administrative parameter tampering to identify credential-based abuse.

Monitoring Recommendations

Monitor PHP error logs for mysqli warnings or fatal errors referencing add_table.php.
Alert on anomalous outbound data volumes from the database host that could indicate mass extraction.
Track administrative account logins and flag off-hours or geographically anomalous access.

How to Mitigate CVE-2026-94042

Immediate Actions Required

Restrict access to the admin/ directory using network ACLs, VPN, or IP allow-listing until a code fix is available.
Rotate administrative credentials and enforce strong password policies to reduce the risk of low-privilege attackers reaching the vulnerable endpoint.
Audit database accounts used by the application and revoke unnecessary privileges such as FILE, CREATE USER, or cross-schema access.

Patch Information

No official patch is available. The project follows a rolling-release model, and the maintainer has not responded to the GitHub Issue Discussion that reported the flaw. Operators should apply a local source-level fix by refactoring admin/add_table.php to use mysqli prepared statements with bound parameters for table, members, and price.

Workarounds

Place the application behind a WAF configured with SQL injection signature enforcement for administrative paths.
Fork the repository and apply parameterized queries to admin/add_table.php, then deploy from the hardened fork.
Disable the table-management feature entirely if it is not actively required in production.

bash

# Example nginx configuration to restrict admin access by source IP
location /admin/ {
    allow 10.0.0.0/24;
    deny  all;
}