GHSA-hgwp-4vp4-qmm2
HIGHGHSA-hgwp-4vp4-qmm2 is a high-severity (CVSS 7.8) CWE-427 vulnerability in github.com/cloudflare/cloudflared. O3 Security confirms whether GHSA-hgwp-4vp4-qmm2 is actually reachable in your code before you act, and blocks exploitation at runtime until you patch.
Local Privilege Escalation in cloudflared
Blast Radius
github.com/cloudflare/cloudflaredReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Go packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
In cloudflared versions < 2020.8.1 (corresponding to 0.0.0-20200820025921-9323844ea773 on pkg.go.dev) on Windows, if an administrator has started cloudflared and set it to read configuration files from a certain directory, an unprivileged user can exploit a misconfiguration in order to escalate privileges and execute system-level commands. The misconfiguration was due to the way that cloudflared reads its configuration file. One of the locations that cloudflared reads from (C:\etc) is not a secure by default directory due to the fact that Windows does not enforce access controls on this directory without further controls applied. A malformed config.yaml file can be written by any user. Upon reading this config, cloudflared would output an error message to a log file defined in the malformed config. The user-controlled log file location could be set to a specific location that Windows will execute when any user logs in.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐹Go | github.com/cloudflare/cloudflared | all versions | 0.0.0-20200820025921-9323844ea773 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/cloudflare/cloudflared. 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 github.com/cloudflare/cloudflared to 0.0.0-20200820025921-9323844ea773 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-hgwp-4vp4-qmm2 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 GHSA-hgwp-4vp4-qmm2 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 GHSA-hgwp-4vp4-qmm2. 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-hgwp-4vp4-qmm2 in your dependencies?
O3 detects GHSA-hgwp-4vp4-qmm2 across Go dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.