CVE intelligence and bounded remediation

CVE-2023-20028 — Cisco Secure Email And Web Manager security vulnerability

Medium CVSS 5.4

Multiple vulnerabilities in the web-based management interface of Cisco AsyncOS Software for Cisco Secure Email and Web Manager; Cisco Secure Email Gateway, formerly Cisco Email Security Appliance (ESA); and Cisco Secure Web Appliance, formerly Cisco Web Security Appliance (WSA), could allow a remote attacker to conduct a cross-site scripting (XSS) attack against a user of the interface. For more information about these vulnerabilities, see the Details section of this advisory.

Severity
Medium
CVSS
5.4 (3.1)
Published
2023-06-28
CISA KEV
Not currently listed
Ecosystem
software/application
Weaknesses
CWE-79

Affected products

  • cisco / secure_email_and_web_manager / 14.0.0-418
  • cisco / secure_email_and_web_manager / 14.0.1-033
  • cisco / secure_email_and_web_manager / 14.0.1-053
  • cisco / secure_email_and_web_manager / 15.0.0-050
  • cisco / secure_email_and_web_manager / 15.0.0-256
  • cisco / secure_email_gateway / 14.0.0-418

Showing 6 representative product identities from 15 source matches. Confirm exact affected versions with the linked vendor and NVD evidence.

Matched remediation archetype

Cross-site scripting and unsafe browser output

This catalog composition supplies bounded fallback guidance. Explicitly reviewed curated workflows load with the complete record below.

Check exposure

  • Trace reflected, stored, and DOM-derived untrusted values into HTML, attributes, URLs, styles, scripts, and client-side template sinks.
  • Identify affected origins, authenticated user roles, sensitive browser capabilities, and where content is shared across tenants.
  • Review framework escaping, rich-text sanitization, legacy templates, and client-side rendering paths.

Remediate safely

  • Use context-aware framework output encoding and safe DOM APIs; keep untrusted data out of executable contexts.
  • Sanitize intentionally supported markup with a maintained allowlist policy and validate URLs and attributes separately.
  • Update affected rendering components and add tests for every output context using inert sentinel markup.

Authoritative sources

Complete CVE record and remediation plan

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