CVE-2018-18074 is a high-severity (CVSS 7.5) CWE-522 vulnerability in requests. 2 public exploit references exist, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for requests — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Insufficiently Protected Credentials in Requests
EPSS Exploitation Probability
EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) is a daily probability model maintained by FIRST.org. It estimates the likelihood a CVE will be exploited in production environments within the next 30 days, derived from real-world threat intelligence signals.
How urgent is this, really
CVE-2018-18074 plotted by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). The shaded corner — EPSS 50%+ and CVSS 7.0+ — is where this CVE doesn't sit, though severity or exploitability alone can still warrant action.
Where this sits among everything scored
Of 377,166 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
requestsReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects PyPI packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
The Requests package before 2.20.0 for Python sends an HTTP Authorization header to an http URI upon receiving a same-hostname https-to-http redirect, which makes it easier for remote attackers to discover credentials by sniffing the network.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐍PyPI | requests | all versions | 2.20.0pip install --upgrade 'requests==2.20.0' |
Research use only. For defensive security, authorized penetration testing, and academic research only. Never execute exploit code against systems without explicit written authorization.
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for requests, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update requests to 2.20.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2018-18074 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 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like CVE-2018-18074 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to CVE-2018-18074. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Fixing This On Your OS
If you run this on a Linux distribution, patch through your package manager against the distro's own security advisory below — it tracks the exact backported fix for your release, which can ship on a different timeline (and sometimes a different severity) than the upstream project.
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Ansible Tower 3.5 for RHEL 7 | ansible-tower-35/ansible-tower:3.5.6-1 | RHBA-2020:1539 |
| Red Hat Ansible Tower 3.6 for RHEL 7 | ansible-tower-36/ansible-tower:3.6.4-1 | RHBA-2020:1540 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | python-requests-0:2.6.0-5.el7 | RHSA-2019:2035 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | python-pip-0:9.0.3-7.el7_7 | RHSA-2020:0850 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | python-virtualenv-0:15.1.0-4.el7_7 | RHSA-2020:0851 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | python-pip-0:9.0.3-7.el7_8 | RHSA-2020:2068 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | python-virtualenv-0:15.1.0-4.el7_8 | RHSA-2020:2081 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | python27:2.7-8020020200117110429.90f98d4f | RHSA-2020:1605 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2018-18074 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds CVE-2018-18074 across PyPI dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.