CVE-2024-34120
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 · uneditedAdobe Experience Manager versions 6.5.20 and earlier are affected by a stored Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability that could be abused by an attacker to inject malicious scripts into vulnerable form fields. Malicious JavaScript may be executed in a victim’s browser when they browse to the page containing the vulnerable field.
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 confidenceStored Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability in Adobe Experience Manager versions 6.5.20 and earlier allows attackers to inject malicious JavaScript into form fields. The malicious payload persists on the server and executes in victims' browsers when they view pages containing the compromised form fields.
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< 6.5.21< 2024.5CVSS 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
- Privileges
- Low
- User interaction
- Required
- Scope
- Changed
- Confidentiality
- Low
- Integrity
- Low
- Availability
- None
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N
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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Determine your Adobe Experience Manager versionAccess the AEM Welcome page and navigate to 'Help' > 'About Adobe Experience Manager', or query the CRXDE Lite at /crx/packmgr/service.jsp to retrieve the version manifest. Alternatively, run: curl -s http://localhost:4502/crx/packmgr/service.jsp?cmd=ls | grep -i versionAffected if The installed version is earlier than 6.5.21 or earlier than the 2024.5 release train (for Cloud/Flex releases)
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Identify custom form components in your implementationNavigate to CRXDE Lite and review nodes under /apps for custom form components, specifically looking in directories such as /apps/core/wcm/components/form or custom projects under /apps/<your-project>/components. Identify any custom form fields, text inputs, or textareas that accept user input.Affected if Custom form components exist that do not leverage AEM's out-of-box form frameworks with built-in XSS protection
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Audit stored form data for suspicious contentUsing CRXDE Lite or the Query tool (XPath search), query the content repository for form submission nodes (for example, under /content/forms/af or custom form containers) and inspect stored values. Look for patterns such as <script>, javascript:, onload=, onerror=, or other HTML/JS injection patterns in field values.Affected if Form submission data contains unsanitized HTML or JavaScript code that was not escaped or validated upon submission
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Review Content Services or Form Data Model integrationsIf your forms integrate with external data sources via Form Data Models (FDM), review the FDM configurations under /conf/global/settings/cloudconfigs/fdm and check whether form field bindings allow unrestricted data storage without output encoding.Affected if FDM bindings store user input directly to repositories without applying AEM's default XSS protection or custom sanitization
You are affected if your AEM version is below 6.5.21 or below 2024.5 AND you use custom or standard form components that accept user input which gets stored and rendered without proper sanitization.
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.
dbcve · scoped6.5.212024.5
Upgrade Adobe Experience Manager to version 6.5.21 or later. Additionally, implement Content Security Policy (CSP) headers and validate/sanitize user inputs in custom form components as defense-in-depth measures.
Adobe Experience Manager 6.5.21 (on-premise) or 2024.5 (AEM Cloud Service)
- 1. Back up the current Adobe Experience Manager instance including repository, database, and configuration files.
- 2. Review the Adobe Experience Manager 6.5.21 release notes and 2024.5 release notes for any migration requirements or breaking changes specific to your instance.
- 3. If running AEM 6.5.x on-premise, upgrade to version 6.5.21 or later by following the standard upgrade documentation.
- 4. If running AEM as a Cloud Service, ensure the environment is updated to the 2024.5 release or later through the Cloud Manager.
- 5. After upgrade, validate that all custom form components and custom form fields are functioning correctly.
- 6. Test the fixed form fields to confirm the XSS payload can no longer be stored and executed.
Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.
- Consultation4.0 h
- Implementation8.0 h
- Testing12.0 h
- Review / QA4.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2024-34120 — 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-2024-34120 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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- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
- No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
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