GHSA-c85w-x26q-ch87 is a high-severity (CVSS 8.2) vulnerability in getformwork/formwork. A fix is available for getformwork/formwork — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Formwork improperly validates input of User role preventing site and panel availability
Real-World Exposure
getformwork/formworkReal-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
Summary
Improper validation of select fields allows attackers to craft an input that crashes the system, resulting in a 500 status and making the entire site and administration panel unavailable. This clearly impacts the Availability aspect of the CIA triad (confidentiality, integrity, and availability), although the attack still has certain limitations.
Details
The attack involves injecting any invalid user role value. Doing this will change the users data in a way that prevents users and then the entire site from loading. Even though the actual data change is minimal, the error is unrecoverable until a valid role parameter is restored by direct modification of the user account file. Proper validation of select fields will prevent extraneous valid from being accepted and making the entire site and administration panel unavailable.
Patches
- Formwork 2.x (d9f0c1f) adds proper validation to select fields.
Impact
The condition for this attack is having high privileges or Admin access, which means it could be exploited by an Insider Threat. Alternatively, if an attacker gains access to a privileged user account, they can execute the attack as well. Overall, the attack is relatively difficult to carry out, but if successful, the impact and damage would be significant.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐘Packagist | getformwork/formwork | ≥ 2.0.0-beta.1&&< 2.0.0-beta.4 | 2.0.0-beta.4composer require getformwork/formwork:^2.0.0-beta.4 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for getformwork/formwork, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update getformwork/formwork to 2.0.0-beta.4 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-c85w-x26q-ch87 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 GHSA-c85w-x26q-ch87 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-c85w-x26q-ch87. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is GHSA-c85w-x26q-ch87 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-c85w-x26q-ch87 across Packagist dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.