CVE-2025-27089
MEDIUMOverlapping policies allow update to non-allowed fields in directus
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.
Blast Radius
Weekly download volume for affected packages — a proxy for how broadly this vulnerability is deployed.
directusnpm@directus/apinpmDescription
Directus is a real-time API and App dashboard for managing SQL database content. In affected versions if there are two overlapping policies for the update action that allow access to different fields, instead of correctly checking access permissions against the item they apply for the user is allowed to update the superset of fields allowed by any of the policies. E.g. have one policy allowing update access to field_a if the id == 1 and one policy allowing update access to field_b if the id == 2. The user with both these policies is allowed to update both field_a and field_b for the items with ids 1 and 2. Before v11, if a user was allowed to update an item they were allowed to update the fields that the single permission, that applied to that item, listed. With overlapping permissions this isn't as clear cut anymore and the union of fields might not be the fields the user is allowed to update for that specific item. The solution that this PR introduces is to evaluate the permissions for each field that the user tries to update in the validateItemAccess DB query, instead of only verifying access to the item as a whole. This is done by, instead of returning the actual field value, returning a flag that indicates if the user has access to that field. This uses the same case/when mechanism that is used for stripping out non permitted field that is at the core of the permissions engine. As a result, for every item that the access is validated for, the expected result is an item that has either 1 or null for all the "requested" fields instead of any of the actual field values. These results are not useful for anything other than verifying the field level access permissions. The final check in validateItemAccess can either fail if the number of items does not match the number of items the access is checked for (ie. the user does not have access to the item at all) or if not all of the passed in fields have access permissions for any of the returned items. This is a vulnerability that allows update access to unintended fields, potentially impacting the password field for user accounts. This has been addressed in version 11.1.2 and all users are advised to upgrade. There are no known workarounds for this vulnerability.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | directus | ≥ 11.0.0&&< 11.1.2 | 11.1.2 |
| 📦npm | @directus/api | ≥ 22.0.0&&< 23.1.0 | 23.1.0 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for directus. 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 directus to 11.1.2 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2025-27089 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-2025-27089 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-2025-27089. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2025-27089 in your dependencies?
O3 detects CVE-2025-27089 across npm dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.