_deprecated_file undefined in rss-functions.php

[thib3113]

If you call wp-includes/rss-functions.php directly, you have an error .

Because _deprecated_file is not defined, you can patch with :

<?php
/**
 * Deprecated. Use rss.php instead.
 *
 * @package WordPress
 */

if(defined(ABSPATH)){
    _deprecated_file( basename(__FILE__), '2.1', WPINC . '/rss.php' );
    require_once( ABSPATH . WPINC . '/rss.php' );
}

[dd32]

Production sites shouldn't be running with display_errors turned on, so the undefined constants & undefined functions warnings/notices/errors aren't seen as a bugs within WordPress.

We also cover this in our ​security handbook.

[thib3113]

Yes, but visiting this webpage produce a http 500 error. So yes, it's not visible, but it exist ...

Why don't just add a single ligne for stop this error ? And making the same in other not-standalone page ...

[dd32]

Yes, but visiting this webpage produce a http 500 error.

On a URL which should never be linked to (And you should also have directory indexing disabled ideally).

You'll get a similar error if you access wp-includes/default-filters.php or any number of others too potentially.

[thib3113]

Replying to dd32:

Yes, but visiting this webpage produce a http 500 error.

On a URL which should never be linked to (And you should also have directory indexing disabled ideally).

It's is not linked, but pentest software know this addresses and check for path. You'are right, in production, we will set debug to false, but in my opinion, we can make attack with this error, maybe with reloading lot of time, and log lot of errors ( I don't know, i'm not a professional in pentesting )...
I just think, let an error is not a good thing, mostly if you just add one line for remove this ...

if(!defined(ABSPATH)) exit();

[TheGP]

Replying to dd32:

Production sites shouldn't be running with display_errors turned on, so the undefined constants & undefined functions warnings/notices/errors aren't seen as a bugs within WordPress.

We also cover this in our ​security handbook.

That's stupid. I have error notification alerts, and I had alerts about this fatal error too. So I just blocked all errors from Wordpress. And this not improving security, because I can't see any errors from Wordpress right now. So fix it and dont make excuses.

+ it adds a lot of trash data to log files (i have thousands of these errors)
+ bots use this bugs in wordpress to scan websites with display_errors On

No wonder wordpress code developers considered as the worst in the industry))

[dd32]

Remarking as invalid. Discussion can continue; a committer can re-open if they feel the need to.

[SergeyBiryukov]

#47945 was marked as a duplicate.

[flymike]

Some hacker has discovered many of the WordPress files containing calls to _deprecated_file() and is inundating my server with direct GET requests to them.
Because that function is not defined in WordPress, Apache returns status 500 and - because, as an administrator, I want to be informed of status 500 - my inbox is deluged with alerts.
I would block the originating IPs but they'e all different, so coming from spambots. And the advantage to the hacker eludes me completely - but it is what it is, and I have to deal with it.
Couldn't WordPress handle calls to deprecated files/functions a little more elegantly? Like it does with direct calls to other files which should not be accessed directly - with status 200 and zero bytes?

[SergeyBiryukov]

Related: #47154

[zodiac1978]

I am not sure why this is handled in this way but the PHP updates in a complete other way.

We do not want to annoy the user with technical details about PHP updates, but we try to make them aware that there is something to fix. We should do the same here at least.

I am not sure why the mentioned line is not added to WordPress to all files which are in need of this, but if we are going this route, why not inform the user about the risk of an enabled display_errors setting?

Therefore I have added an issue to the health check plugin about adding this check:
​https://github.com/WordPress/health-check/issues/370

If you are searching for this error message you get roughly 30k hits and these are just those websites which also have enabled public accessible error logging (Google finds the error log file with this error message in it). There will be much more websites with this problem.