How severe is CVE-2023-27577?

CVE-2023-27577 has a CVSS score of 6.6/10, rated MEDIUM. Review your exposure and patch according to your risk tolerance.

Which packages are affected by CVE-2023-27577?

CVE-2023-27577 affects the following packages: flarum/core (Packagist). Ecosystems affected: Packagist.

How do I fix CVE-2023-27577?

Update flarum/core to 1.7.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2023-27577 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.

How do I detect CVE-2023-27577 in my Packagist dependencies?

Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for flarum/core. O3's reachability analysis confirms whether the vulnerable code path is actually invoked in your application, so you act on real exposure instead of every transitive match.

How do I mitigate CVE-2023-27577 if there is no patch (or I can't update yet)?

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 does O3 Security protect against CVE-2023-27577?

O3 pinpoints whether CVE-2023-27577 is reachable in your code and exactly where to fix it, then blocks exploitation in production at runtime until the patched version is deployed.

Is CVE-2023-27577 actively exploited in the wild?

No public exploit code has been indexed for CVE-2023-27577 yet. This does not mean the vulnerability cannot be exploited — absence of public exploits does not imply safety. Apply the recommended fix and use O3 Security to monitor your exposure.

What is the EPSS score for CVE-2023-27577?

CVE-2023-27577 has an EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) score of 0.9%, placing it in the 53th percentile of all CVEs. EPSS is maintained by FIRST.org and estimates the probability that a vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days. This score indicates relatively lower exploitation probability, though the CVSS severity should still guide your patching priority.

What type of vulnerability is CVE-2023-27577?

CVE-2023-27577 is classified as Path Traversal (CWE-22). This weakness type describe the underlying flaw category, which helps determine the potential impact and the right class of mitigation. This is a high-impact weakness class that often enables remote code execution or data exposure.

When was CVE-2023-27577 published, and has it been updated?

CVE-2023-27577 was published on March 10, 2023 and was last updated on April 10, 2026. Advisory data evolves as severity scores, affected ranges, and exploit intelligence are revised — always check the latest version of the advisory before acting.

CVE-2023-27577: flarum/core Path Traversal (Medium 6.6)

EPSS Exploitation Probability

via FIRST.org ↗

0.9%probability of exploitation in next 30 days

Lower Risk53th percentile+0.73%

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.

Blast Radius

1 pkg affected

🐘flarum/core

Real-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

flarum is a forum software package for building communities. In versions prior to 1.7.0 an admin account which has already been compromised by an attacker may use a vulnerability in the LESS parser which can be exploited to read sensitive files on the server through the use of path traversal techniques. An attacker can achieve this by providing an absolute path to a sensitive file in the custom LESS setting, which the LESS parser will then read. For example, an attacker could use the following code to read the contents of the /etc/passwd file on a linux machine. The scope of what files are vulnerable will depend on the permissions given to the running flarum process. The vulnerability has been addressed in version 1.7. Users should upgrade to this version to mitigate the vulnerability. Users unable to upgrade may mitigate the vulnerability by ensuring that their admin accounts are secured with strong passwords and follow other best practices for account security. Additionally, users can limit the exposure of sensitive files on the server by implementing appropriate file permissions and access controls at the operating system level.

Affected Packages

1 total 1 fixed

Ecosystem	Package	Vulnerable range	Fix
🐘Packagist	`flarum/core`	all versions	1.7.0

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency

Detect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for flarum/core. O3's reachability analysis confirms whether the vulnerable code path is actually invoked in your application, so you act on real exposure instead of every transitive match.
Fix
Update flarum/core to 1.7.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2023-27577 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 pinpoints whether CVE-2023-27577 is reachable in your code and exactly where to fix it, then blocks exploitation in production at runtime until the patched version is deployed.

Tailored to CVE-2023-27577. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.

Frequently Asked Questions

flarum is a forum software package for building communities. In versions prior to 1.7.0 an admin account which has already been compromised by an attacker may use a vulnerability in the `LESS` parser which can be exploited to read sensitive files on the server through the use of path traversal techniques. An attacker can achieve this by providing an absolute path to a sensitive file in the custom `LESS` setting, which the `LESS` parser will then read. For example, an attacker could use the following code to read the contents of the `/etc/passwd` file on a linux machine. The scope of what files

O3 Security · Impact-Aware SCA

Is CVE-2023-27577 in your dependencies?

O3 detects CVE-2023-27577 across Packagist dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.

Scan my dependencies How O3 SCA works

CVE-2023-27577