HAXcms Cross-Tenant Account Takeover via Stored XSS and Token Exposure

HAXcms is vulnerable to a critical account takeover vulnerability stemming from a combination of stored XSS and insecure token handling. The vulnerability, present in versions 25.0.0 and earlier, allows an authenticated attacker to inject malicious JavaScript code into a page that, when viewed by another user, exfiltrates that user’s authentication tokens. The /system/api/connectionSettings endpoint dynamically leaks sensitive tokens into a global JavaScript variable (window.appSettings), which can be accessed and stolen via XSS. This vulnerability allows for complete cross-tenant account hijacking, enabling attackers to perform administrative actions without needing the victim’s password.

Attack Chain

1. Attacker authenticates to the HAXcms application with valid credentials.
2. Attacker injects malicious JavaScript code via a stored XSS vulnerability, such as within an iframe’s srcdoc or through a <video-player> tag, on a page they have write access to.
3. The victim user views the compromised page.
4. The injected JavaScript executes in the victim’s browser context.
5. The JavaScript fetches the victim’s connection settings via fetch('/<username>/system/api/connectionSettings'), which includes the victim’s valid JWT and tokens.
6. The JavaScript parses the jwt, user_token, site_token, and appstore_token from the response.
7. The JavaScript encodes the stolen tokens (including jwt, user_token, site_token, and appstore_token) using Base64 encoding.
8. The JavaScript exfiltrates the encoded tokens to an attacker-controlled webhook using an image request to bypass CORS. The attacker now has the ability to impersonate the victim and perform administrative actions.

Impact

This vulnerability allows for complete account hijacking. An attacker who successfully exploits this vulnerability can impersonate a victim user without needing their password. This gives the attacker the ability to perform malicious administrative actions, such as creating or deleting sites, modifying user access, and uploading malicious content. The reliance on window.appSettings for storing long-lived administrative tokens creates a critical vulnerability when combined with XSS.

Recommendation

• Deploy the Sigma rule Detect HAXcms Connection Settings Request to detect requests to the /system/api/connectionSettings endpoint from unusual sources, and tune for your environment.
• Deploy the Sigma rule Detect HAXcms Token Exfiltration via Webhook to detect attempts to exfiltrate the tokens to external webhooks.
• Ensure that all HAXcms instances are updated to a patched version that addresses this vulnerability to prevent CVE-2026-46511 exploitation.