CVE-2023-28836

Wagtail is an open source content management system built on Django. Starting in version 1.5 and prior to versions 4.1.4 and 4.2.2, a stored cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability exists on ModelAdmin views within the Wagtail admin interface. A user with a limited-permission editor account for the Wagtail admin could potentially craft pages and documents that, when viewed by a user with higher privileges, could perform actions with that user's credentials. The vulnerability is not exploitable by an ordinary site visitor without access to the Wagtail admin, and only affects sites with ModelAdmin enabled. For page, the vulnerability is in the "Choose a parent page" ModelAdmin view (`ChooseParentView`), available when managing pages via ModelAdmin. For documents, the vulnerability is in the ModelAdmin Inspect view (`InspectView`) when displaying document fields. Patched versions have been released as Wagtail 4.1.4 and Wagtail 4.2.2. Site owners who are unable to upgrade to the new versions can disable or override the corresponding functionality.

• CWE-79

• https://docs.wagtail.org/en/stable/reference/contrib/modeladmin/chooseparentview.html#customising-chooseparentviewProduct
• https://docs.wagtail.org/en/stable/reference/contrib/modeladmin/inspectview.html#enabling-customising-inspectviewProduct
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/commit/5be2b1ed55fd7259dfdf2c82e7701dba407b8b62Patch
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/commit/bc84bf9815610cfbf8db3b6050c7ddcbaa4b9713Release Notes
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/commit/eefc3381d37b476791610e5d30594fae443f33afRelease Notes
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/commit/ff806ab173a504395fdfb3139eb0a29444ab4b91Patch
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/releases/tag/v4.2.2Release Notes
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/security/advisories/GHSA-5286-f2rf-35c2Mitigation, Vendor Advisory
• https://docs.wagtail.org/en/stable/reference/contrib/modeladmin/chooseparentview.html#customising-chooseparentviewProduct
• https://docs.wagtail.org/en/stable/reference/contrib/modeladmin/inspectview.html#enabling-customising-inspectviewProduct
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/commit/5be2b1ed55fd7259dfdf2c82e7701dba407b8b62Patch
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/commit/bc84bf9815610cfbf8db3b6050c7ddcbaa4b9713Release Notes
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/commit/eefc3381d37b476791610e5d30594fae443f33afRelease Notes
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/commit/ff806ab173a504395fdfb3139eb0a29444ab4b91Patch
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/releases/tag/v4.2.2Release Notes
• https://github.com/wagtail/wagtail/security/advisories/GHSA-5286-f2rf-35c2Mitigation, Vendor Advisory

Published

Apr 3, 2023

Last Modified

Jun 17, 2026

Status

Modified