CVE-2021-41132
📋 TL;DR
CVE-2021-41132 is a critical cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in OMERO.web that allows attackers to inject malicious scripts into web pages. This affects all users of OMERO.web versions before 5.11.0, potentially compromising user sessions and data.
💻 Affected Systems
- OMERO.web
📦 What is this software?
Omero Figure by Openmicroscopy
Omero Web by Openmicroscopy
⚠️ Risk & Real-World Impact
Worst Case
Complete account takeover, data theft, credential harvesting, and lateral movement within the application.
Likely Case
Session hijacking, data exfiltration, and unauthorized actions performed on behalf of authenticated users.
If Mitigated
Limited impact due to proper input validation and output encoding controls.
🎯 Exploit Status
Exploitation requires user interaction with malicious content but is technically simple.
🛠️ Fix & Mitigation
✅ Official Fix
Patch Version: 5.11.0
Vendor Advisory: https://www.openmicroscopy.org/security/advisories/2021-SV3/
Restart Required: Yes
Instructions:
1. Backup your OMERO installation. 2. Upgrade OMERO.web to version 5.11.0 or later using your package manager or from source. 3. Restart the OMERO.web service.
🔧 Temporary Workarounds
No workarounds available
allThe vendor states there are no known workarounds aside from upgrading.
🧯 If You Can't Patch
- Implement strict Content Security Policy (CSP) headers to limit script execution
- Deploy a web application firewall (WAF) with XSS protection rules
🔍 How to Verify
Check if Vulnerable:
Check OMERO.web version via web interface or configuration files.Check Version:
Check omero-web version in package manager or via 'pip show omero-web'Verify Fix Applied:
Confirm version is 5.11.0 or higher and test input fields for proper HTML escaping.📡 Detection & Monitoring
Log Indicators:
- Unusual JavaScript payloads in request logs
- Multiple failed XSS attempts
Network Indicators:
- Suspicious script tags in HTTP requests to OMERO endpoints
SIEM Query:
web_requests WHERE url CONTAINS 'omero' AND (body CONTAINS '<script>' OR body CONTAINS 'javascript:')🔗 References
- https://github.com/ome/omero-web/commit/0168067accde5e635341b3c714b1d53ae92ba424
- https://github.com/ome/omero-web/security/advisories/GHSA-g67g-hvc3-xmvf
- https://www.openmicroscopy.org/security/advisories/2021-SV3/
- https://github.com/ome/omero-web/commit/0168067accde5e635341b3c714b1d53ae92ba424
- https://github.com/ome/omero-web/security/advisories/GHSA-g67g-hvc3-xmvf
- https://www.openmicroscopy.org/security/advisories/2021-SV3/
