CVE-2016-5705
MEDIUMCVE-2016-5705 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.1) Cross-site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability in phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin. O3 Security confirms whether CVE-2016-5705 is actually reachable in your code before you act, and blocks exploitation at runtime until you patch.
phpMyAdmin vulnerable to Cross-site Scripting
Blast Radius
phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin🐘phpmyadmin/phpmyadminReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Packagist packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Multiple cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities in phpMyAdmin 4.4.x before 4.4.15.7 and 4.6.x before 4.6.3 allow remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via vectors involving (1) server-privileges certificate data fields on the user privileges page, (2) an "invalid JSON" error message in the error console, (3) a database name in the central columns implementation, (4) a group name, or (5) a search name in the bookmarks implementation.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐘Packagist | phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin | ≥ 4.4.0&&< 4.4.15.7 | 4.4.15.7 |
| 🐘Packagist | phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin | ≥ 4.6.0&&< 4.6.3 | 4.6.3 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin. O3's reachability analysis confirms whether the vulnerable code path is actually invoked in your application, so you act on real exposure instead of every transitive match.
Fix
Update phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin to 4.4.15.7 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2016-5705 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
If you can't upgrade right away: gate or disable the affected feature, validate untrusted input at the boundary, and avoid passing attacker-controlled data into the vulnerable path. O3's runtime protection blocks exploitation in production as an interim safeguard until the upgrade lands.
How O3 protects you
O3 pinpoints whether CVE-2016-5705 is reachable in your code and exactly where to fix it, then blocks exploitation in production at runtime until the patched version is deployed.
Tailored to CVE-2016-5705. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2016-5705 in your dependencies?
O3 detects CVE-2016-5705 across Packagist dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.