CAPEC-83

XPath Injection

High severityHigh likelihoodDetailed pattern

An attacker can craft special user-controllable input consisting of XPath expressions to inject the XML database and bypass authentication or glean information that they normally would not be able to. XPath Injection enables an attacker to talk directly to the XML database, thus bypassing the application completely. XPath Injection results from the failure of an application to properly sanitize input used as part of dynamic XPath expressions used to query an XML database.

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How the attack unfolds
Prerequisites
Skills required
Resources required
Signs of an attack
Consequences
Mitigations
Weaknesses it exploits
Related attack patterns
Examples

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Explain the attack pattern CAPEC-83: XPath Injection: how it unfolds, what it needs and how to prevent and detect it in my systems. Use https://capec.mitre.org/data/definitions/83.html and https://cve.bz/cve/capec/83?via=ask-ai-copy, which lists recent CVEs with the weaknesses it exploits. Cite the sources.

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How the attack unfolds

Explore
The attacker looks for a way in.
1. [Survey the target] Using a browser or an automated tool, an adversary records all instances of user-controllable input used to contruct XPath queries.
  2 techniques
  - Use an automated tool to record all instances of user-controllable input used to contruct XPath queries.
  - Use a browser to manually explore the website and analyze how the application processes inputs.
2. [Determine the tructure of queries] Using manual or automated means, test inputs found for XPath weaknesses.
  2 techniques
  - Use an automated tool automatically probe the inputs for XPath weaknesses.
  - Manually probe the inputs using characters such as single quote (') that can cause XPath-releated errors, thus indicating an XPath weakness.
Exploit
They carry out the attack.
1. [Inject content into XPath query] Craft malicious content containing XPath expressions that is not validated by the application and is executed as part of the XPath queries.
  3 techniques
  - Use the crafted input to execute unexpected queries that can disclose sensitive database information to the attacker.
  - Use a combination of single quote (') and boolean expressions such as "or 1=1" to manipulate XPath logic.
  - Use XPath functions in the malicious content such as "string-length", "substring", or "count" to gain information about the XML document structure being used.

Prerequisites

XPath queries used to retrieve information stored in XML documents
User-controllable input not properly sanitized before being used as part of XPath queries

Skills required

Low skill
XPath Injection shares the same basic premises with SQL Injection. An attacker must have knowledge of XPath syntax and constructs in order to successfully leverage XPath Injection

Resources required

None: No specialized resources are required to execute this type of attack.

Signs of an attack

Too many exceptions generated by the application as a result of malformed XPath queries

Consequences

What a successful attack can lead to
Impact	Affects	Note
Gain Privileges	Confidentiality, Access Control, Authorization
Read Data	Confidentiality

Mitigations

Strong input validation - All user-controllable input must be validated and filtered for illegal characters as well as content that can be interpreted in the context of an XPath expression. Characters such as a single-quote(') or operators such as or (|), and (&) and such should be filtered if the application does not expect them in the context in which they appear. If such content cannot be filtered, it must at least be properly escaped to avoid them being interpreted as part of XPath expressions.
Use of parameterized XPath queries - Parameterization causes the input to be restricted to certain domains, such as strings or integers, and any input outside such domains is considered invalid and the query fails.
Use of custom error pages - Attackers can glean information about the nature of queries from descriptive error messages. Input validation must be coupled with customized error pages that inform about an error without disclosing information about the database or application.

Weaknesses it exploits

CWE-20 Improper Input Validation
CWE-74 Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component
CWE-91 XML Injection
CWE-707 Improper Neutralization

Recent CVEs with these weaknesses

9.6CVE-2026-1081862026-11-10
Improper Input Validation in Zoom Workplace for Windows may allow an unauthenticated user to conduct an escalation of privilege via network access.
4.9CVE-2026-1054272026-11-10
Improper input validation in Ivanti EPMM before version 12.10.0.1, 12.9.0.3, and 12.8.0.5 allows a remote authenticated attacker with admin privileges to permanently disable all Apache HTTPS services resulting in denial of service.
6.7CVE-2026-1054262026-11-10
Improper input validation in Ivanti EPMM before version 12.10.0.1, 12.9.0.3, and 12.8.0.5 allows a remote authenticated attacker with admin privileges to set arbitrary Linux kernel parameters as root.
4.3CVE-2026-1231782026-11-10
An insufficient input validation vulnerability in the listed NETGEAR Orbi Models router allows an authenticated administrator connected to the local network to execute unauthorized commands and modify the router’s software and functionalit…
6.3CVE-2026-1258712026-11-10
The sourcecache expansion module in MISP Modules (misp-modules) contains a Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF) vulnerability. When a user with permission to create or modify attributes of type 'link' or 'url' submits an attribute value, the…
5.5CVE-2026-1257032026-11-10
A flaw was found in the GStreamer gst-plugins-bad MXF plugin. Insufficient bounds checks when parsing crafted VANC data can cause an out-of-bounds read in the demuxer, while an incorrect buffer size calculation when muxing multiple ancilla…
5.3CVE-2026-1251132026-11-09
The XRootD project provides a high-performance, fault-tolerant, and secure solution for handling large amounts of data distributed across multiple storage resources. Prior to version 5.9.2, XRootD's rpCheck() function in src/XrdXrootd/XrdX…
6.9CVE-2026-636342026-11-09
pympp is a Python SDK for the Machine Payments Protocol. Prior to version 0.9.1, when the server acts as the fee_payer, pympp validates calldata using eth_abi decoding, which is lenient about trailing bytes. The FeePayerPolicy caps gas_lim…

The newest records naming one of them. Each weakness's page lists them all.

Part of: CAPEC-250 XML Injection

Examples

Consider an application that uses an XML database to authenticate its users. The application retrieves the us…

Consider an application that uses an XML database to authenticate its users. The application retrieves the user name and password from a request and forms an XPath expression to query the database. An attacker can successfully bypass authentication and login without valid credentials through XPath Injection. This can be achieved by injecting the query to the XML database with XPath syntax that causes the authentication check to fail. Improper validation of user-controllable input and use of a non-parameterized XPath expression enable the attacker to inject an XPath expression that causes authentication bypass.

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