CVE-2024-4540 is a high-severity (CVSS 7.5) CWE-312 vulnerability in org.keycloak:keycloak-services. A fix is available for org.keycloak:keycloak-services — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Keycloak exposes sensitive information in Pushed Authorization Requests (PAR)
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation observed yet
- CISA assesses this as automatable — exploitation doesn’t require manual, per-target effort, which raises the odds of mass scanning and opportunistic attacks.
- CISA’s own triage has not observed active exploitation or public proof-of-concept code for this CVE as of its last assessment.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2024-4540.
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
org.keycloak:keycloak-servicesReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Maven packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
A flaw was found in Keycloak in the OAuth 2.0 Pushed Authorization Requests (PAR). Client provided parameters were found to be included in plain text in the KC_RESTART cookie returned by the authorization server's HTTP response to a request_uri authorization request. This could lead to an information disclosure vulnerability.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☕Maven | org.keycloak:keycloak-services | all versions | 24.0.5org.keycloak:keycloak-services:24.0.5 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for org.keycloak:keycloak-services, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update org.keycloak:keycloak-services to 24.0.5 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2024-4540 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.
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.
Mitigation for this issue is either not available or the currently available options don't meet the Red Hat Product Security criteria comprising ease of use and deployment, applicability to widespread installation base or stability.Source: Red Hat security advisory for CVE-2024-4540 (CC BY 4.0)
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Build of Keycloak | see advisory | RHSA-2024:3574 |
| Red Hat Build of Keycloak | see advisory | RHSA-2024:3575 |
| Red Hat build of Keycloak 22 | rhbk/keycloak-operator-bundle:22.0.11-2 | RHSA-2024:3573 |
| Red Hat build of Keycloak 24 | rhbk/keycloak-operator-bundle:24.0.5-2 | RHSA-2024:3576 |
| Red Hat Single Sign-On 7 | see advisory | RHSA-2024:3572 |
| Red Hat Single Sign-On 7.6 for RHEL 7 | rh-sso7-keycloak-0:18.0.14-1.redhat_00001.1.el7sso | RHSA-2024:3566 |
| Red Hat Single Sign-On 7.6 for RHEL 8 | rh-sso7-keycloak-0:18.0.14-1.redhat_00001.1.el8sso | RHSA-2024:3567 |
| Red Hat Single Sign-On 7.6 for RHEL 9 | rh-sso7-keycloak-0:18.0.14-1.redhat_00001.1.el9sso | RHSA-2024:3568 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2024-4540 in your dependencies?
Find it across Maven, including transitive dependencies.