CVE-2020-26935 — phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin
CRITICALCVE-2020-26935 is a critical-severity (CVSS 9.8) SQL Injection vulnerability in phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin. 1 public exploit reference exists, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin — see the affected versions and patch details below.
phpMyAdmin SQL injection vulnerability
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-2020-26935 plotted by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). The shaded corner — EPSS 50%+ and CVSS 7.0+ — is where this CVE sits: patch-first territory.
Where this sits among everything scored
Of 377,238 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the 50–90% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
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
An issue was discovered in SearchController in phpMyAdmin before 4.9.6 and 5.x before 5.0.3. A SQL injection vulnerability was discovered in how phpMyAdmin processes SQL statements in the search feature. An attacker could use this flaw to inject malicious SQL in to a query.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐘Packagist | phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin | ≥ 4.9.0&&< 4.9.6 | 4.9.6composer require phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin:^4.9.6 |
| 🐘Packagist | phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin | ≥ 5.0.0&&< 5.0.3 | 5.0.3composer require phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin:^5.0.3 |
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 phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update phpmyadmin/phpmyadmin to 4.9.6 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2020-26935 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-2020-26935 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to CVE-2020-26935. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
How to detect CVE-2020-26935
A community-maintained Nuclei template exists for this CVE. You can scan for it directly:
nuclei -id cve-2020-26935 -u https://target- Template
- phpMyAdmin < 5.0.3 - SQL Injection
- Severity
- critical
- Impact
- Attackers can execute arbitrary SQL commands, potentially leading to data theft, modification, or deletion.
- Remediation
- Update to phpMyAdmin 4.9.6 or 5.0.3, or latest version.
Template by ProjectDiscovery nuclei-templates (0x_Akoko), MIT licensed. View the full template. Scan only systems you are authorised to test.
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.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2020-26935 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds CVE-2020-26935 across Packagist dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.