CVE-2012-6708

Think of jQuery as a tool your site uses to “turn text into page instructions.” In older versions (before 1.9.0), attackers can sometimes smuggle malicious instructions inside text that came from a user’s browser. If your pages pass that untrusted text into jQuery in a specific way, the victim’s browser can end up running the attacker’s scripts.

This matters if you run a website or web app that includes jquery (including common packaging ecosystems such as jquery-rails) and you’re using a version older than the fixed releases. It’s also relevant if your environment ships an outdated jQuery copy (for example, in packaged platforms). The practical risk is mainly if an attacker can reach a page where your app processes user-controlled input and passes it into jQuery as strInput; exploitation requires user interaction, and whether your default setup is reachable is not confirmed.

This should be treated as AMBER because there’s a public proof-of-concept available and reports/interest in the issue are increasing. While it’s not listed as confirmed in CISA’s known exploited list, attackers don’t need an account—only a way to get a victim to visit a page that hits the vulnerable jQuery code path.