Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in Apache 2.2.6 and earlier allows remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via UTF-7 encoded URLs that are not properly handled when displaying the 403 Forbidden error page.

According to its banner, the version of Apache HTTP Server running on the remote host can be used in cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks. Making a specially crafted request can inject UTF-7 encoded script code into a 403 response page, resulting in XSS attacks. 

This is actually a web browser vulnerability that occurs due to non-compliance with RFC 2616 (refer to BID 29112).  Apache HTTP Server is not vulnerable, but its default configuration can trigger the non-compliant, exploitable behavior in vulnerable browsers.

It was discovered that Apache did not sanitize the method specifier header from an HTTP request when it is returned in an error message, which could result in browsers becoming vulnerable to cross-site scripting attacks when processing the output. With cross-site scripting vulnerabilities, if a user were tricked into viewing server output during a crafted server request, a remote attacker could exploit this to modify the contents, or steal confidential data (such as passwords), within the same domain. This issue only affected Ubuntu 6.06 LTS and 7.10. (CVE-2007-6203)

It was discovered that Apache was vulnerable to a cross-site request forgery (CSRF) in the mod_proxy_balancer balancer manager. If an Apache administrator were tricked into clicking a link on a specially crafted web page, an attacker could trigger commands that could modify the balancer manager configuration. This issue only affected Ubuntu 7.10 and 8.04 LTS. (CVE-2007-6420)

It was discovered that Apache had a memory leak when using mod_ssl with compression. A remote attacker could exploit this to exhaust server memory, leading to a denial of service. This issue only affected Ubuntu 7.10. (CVE-2008-1678)

It was discovered that in certain conditions, Apache did not specify a default character set when returning certain error messages containing UTF-7 encoded data, which could result in browsers becoming vulnerable to cross-site scripting attacks when processing the output. This issue only affected Ubuntu 6.06 LTS and 7.10. (CVE-2008-2168)

It was discovered that when configured as a proxy server, Apache did not limit the number of forwarded interim responses. A malicious remote server could send a large number of interim responses and cause a denial of service via memory exhaustion. (CVE-2008-2364)

It was discovered that mod_proxy_ftp did not sanitize wildcard pathnames when they are returned in directory listings, which could result in browsers becoming vulnerable to cross-site scripting attacks when processing the output. (CVE-2008-2939).

Note that Tenable Network Security has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Ubuntu security advisory. Tenable has attempted to automatically clean and format it as much as possible without introducing additional issues.

ID	Name	Product	Family	Severity
17696	Apache HTTP Server 403 Error Page UTF-7 Encoded XSS	Nessus	Web Servers	medium
36589	Ubuntu 6.06 LTS / 7.10 / 8.04 LTS : apache2 vulnerabilities (USN-731-1)	Nessus	Ubuntu Local Security Checks	medium

Detections

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CVE-2008-2168

medium

Tenable Plugins

medium

medium