CVE-2023-0609 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) CWE-285 vulnerability in wallabag/wallabag. 1 public exploit or proof-of-concept reference is indexed, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for wallabag/wallabag — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Improper Authorization in wallabag/wallabag
Exploitation Status
Proof-of-concept exploit code exists
- CISA’s SSVC triage found public proof-of-concept exploit code for this CVE, though no confirmed active exploitation.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2023-0609.
EPSS Exploitation Probability
Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, from FIRST.org EPSS.
How urgent is this, really
Where this sits among everything scored
Real-World Exposure
wallabag/wallabagReal-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
Description
The export feature lets a user export a single entry or a set of entries in a given format (e.g. PDF, MOBI, TXT).
For example, https://yourinstance.wallabag.org/export/45.pdf will export the entry with id 45 in PDF format.
Since wallabag 2.0.0-alpha.1, this feature is vulnerable to an insecure direct object reference attack. A logged user can export any single entry without ownership validation.
This is due to a lack of access validation in the downloadEntryAction method.
You should immediately patch your instance to version 2.5.3 or higher if you have more than one user and/or having open registration.
Resolution
A user check is now done in the vulnerable method before sending the exported entry.
The Entry retrieval through a ParamConverter has also been replaced with a call to the EntryRepository in order to prevent any information disclosure through response discrepancy.
Workaround
If you are unable to update to the latest version or if you want to temporarily limit risk of exploitation, you may consider blocking requests to the endpoint /export/*.
E.g. with nginx:
location /export {
deny all;
}
Credits
We would like to thank @bAuh0lz for reporting this issue through huntr.dev.
Reference: https://www.huntr.dev/bounties/3adef66f-fc86-4e6d-a540-2ffa59342ff0/
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐘Packagist | wallabag/wallabag | ≥ 2.0.0-alpha.1&&< 2.5.3 | 2.5.3composer require wallabag/wallabag:^2.5.3 |
Affected Products
wallabagwallabagResearch 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 wallabag/wallabag, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update wallabag/wallabag to 2.5.3 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2023-0609 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
Assume what was exposed is already known: rotate any credential, token or key that the affected component could return, restrict the endpoint to callers that genuinely need it, and strip sensitive fields from responses and error output at the boundary rather than relying on the client not to read them.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2023-0609 in your dependencies?
Find it across Packagist, including transitive dependencies.