CVE-2024-58136: Critical Vulnerability in Yii 2 Framework Leading to Potential System Compromise

Overview

CVE-2024-58136 is a severe vulnerability discovered in Yii 2, a high-performance component-based PHP framework used for developing modern web applications. This vulnerability, if exploited, allows attackers to manipulate the behavior of Yii 2 web applications, potentially leading to system compromise or data leakage.
Given that Yii 2 is widely used in web development, this vulnerability presents a significant threat to numerous applications, their developers, and their users. Thus, understanding the nature of CVE-2024-58136 and how to mitigate it is of utmost importance for all stakeholders in the web development and cybersecurity ecosystem.

Vulnerability Summary

CVE ID: CVE-2024-58136
Severity: Critical (CVSS score 9.0)
Attack Vector: Remote
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: None
Impact: System compromise or data leakage

Affected Products

Product | Affected Versions

Yii 2 | Before 2.0.52

How the Exploit Works

The vulnerability stems from Yii 2’s mishandling of the attaching of behavior defined by an ‘class array key. This mishandling, a regression related to CVE-2024-4990, enables an attacker to remotely inject malicious behaviors into the application.
When exploited, this vulnerability allows the attacker to manipulate application behavior, potentially leading to unauthorized access, data manipulation, or system compromise. This vulnerability was exploited in the wild between February and April 2025.

Conceptual Example Code

Below is a conceptual example of how the vulnerability might be exploited. Please note that this is a simplified example, and real-world exploits may be more complex.

<?php
// Malicious behavior
$malicious_behavior = [
'class' => 'app\components\MaliciousBehavior',
];
// Attaching the behavior to the application
Yii::$app->attachBehavior('malicious_behavior', $malicious_behavior);
?>

In this example, the attacker is attaching a malicious behavior defined in the ‘app\components\MaliciousBehavior’ class to the Yii 2 application.

Recommendations for Mitigation

To mitigate this critical vulnerability, users of Yii 2 are strongly advised to update their framework to version 2.0.52 or later, where the issue has been addressed. If immediate patching is not feasible, using a Web Application Firewall (WAF) or Intrusion Detection System (IDS) can provide temporary protection by detecting and blocking attempts to exploit this vulnerability. However, these are temporary solutions and updating the Yii 2 version remains the most effective mitigation strategy.