CVE-2001-0911
Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.
NVD · uneditedPHP-Nuke 5.1 stores user and administrator passwords in a base-64 encoded cookie, which could allow remote attackers to gain privileges by stealing or sniffing the cookie and decoding it.
Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.
dbcve analysis · high confidencePHP-Nuke 5.1 stores user and administrator passwords in base-64 encoded cookies. Since base-64 is encoding (not encryption), attackers who intercept or steal these cookies can trivially decode them to obtain plaintext passwords and gain unauthorized access to user or administrative accounts.
Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.
Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.
NVD · CPE data= 5.1= 5.2= 5.3.1= 0.64CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.
From the vector- Attack vector
- Network
- Complexity
- Low
- Authentication
- None
- Confidentiality
- Partial
- Integrity
- Partial
- Availability
- Partial
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P
Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.
dbcve checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Identify the installed CMS versionCheck the version file or admin panel of the PHP-Nuke or Postnuke installation. Look for version.php, config.php, or the admin dashboard version display.Affected if The version is 5.1, 5.2, 5.3.1 (PHP-Nuke) or 0.64 (Postnuke)
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Inspect browser cookies for authentication dataUsing browser developer tools or a cookie inspector, examine cookies set by the application. Look for cookies with names like 'user', 'admin', 'pass', or 'password'.Affected if Cookies contain base-64 encoded values that decode to reveal plaintext passwords
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Verify cookie-based password storage in source codeExamine the authentication and session handling code. Look for functions that set cookies using base64_encode() on password variables. Check files like auth.php, session.php, or mainfile.php.Affected if Code uses base64_encode() to store passwords in cookies instead of secure session tokens
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Check if cookie authentication is enabledReview the application configuration (config.php or similar) for cookie-related settings. Determine if the system relies on cookies for storing credentials rather than session IDs.Affected if The application is configured to store credentials in cookies for authentication persistence
You are affected if you are running PHP-Nuke 5.1, 5.2, 5.3.1 or Postnuke 0.64 and the application stores base-64 encoded passwords in cookies for authentication.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.
From vendor dataReplace cookie-based password storage with server-side session management, implement proper session tokens, and migrate away from this legacy PHP-Nuke installation to a supported CMS platform.
- Consultation4.0 h
- Implementation16.0 h
- Testing4.0 h
- Review / QA4.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $8,000.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2001-0911 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2001-0911 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.
- Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
- No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
- No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data