GHSA-w23q-4hw3-2pp6 is a high-severity (CVSS 8.8) CWE-668 vulnerability in github.com/minio/minio. A fix is available for github.com/minio/minio — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Minio vulnerable to Privilege Escalation on Windows via Path separator manipulation
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation observed yet
- A successful exploit gives an attacker total control of the affected component, not partial access.
- 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 GHSA-w23q-4hw3-2pp6.
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.
How urgent is this, really
GHSA-w23q-4hw3-2pp6 plotted by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). The shaded corner — EPSS 50%+ and CVSS 7.0+ — is where this CVE doesn't sit, though severity or exploitability alone can still warrant action.
Where this sits among everything scored
Of 376,715 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
github.com/minio/minioReal-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
Impact
All users on Windows are impacted. MinIO fails to filter the \ character, which allows for arbitrary object placement across
buckets. As a result, a user with low privileges, such as an access key, service account, or STS credential, which only has permission to PutObject in a specific bucket, can create an admin user.
Patches
There are two patches that fix this problem comprehensively
commit b3c54ec81e0a06392abfb3a1ffcdc80c6fbf6ebc
Author: Harshavardhana <[email protected]>
Date: Mon Mar 20 13:16:00 2023 -0700
reject object names with '\' on windows (#16856)
commit 8d6558b23649f613414c8527b58973fbdfa4d1b8
Author: Harshavardhana <[email protected]>
Date: Mon Mar 20 00:35:25 2023 -0700
fix: convert '\' to '/' on windows (#16852)
Workarounds
There are no known workarounds
References
The vulnerable code:
// minio/cmd/generic-handlers.go
// Check if the incoming path has bad path components,
// such as ".." and "."
// SlashSeparator -> /
// dotdotComponent -> ..
// dotComponent -> .
func hasBadPathComponent(path string) bool {
path = strings.TrimSpace(path)
for _, p := range strings.Split(path, SlashSeparator) {
switch strings.TrimSpace(p) {
case dotdotComponent:
return true
case dotComponent:
return true
}
}
return false
}
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐹Go | github.com/minio/minio | all versions | 0.0.0-202303200735go get github.com/minio/minio@v0.0.0-202303200735 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/minio/minio, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update github.com/minio/minio to 0.0.0-202303200735 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-w23q-4hw3-2pp6 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-w23q-4hw3-2pp6 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-w23q-4hw3-2pp6. 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-w23q-4hw3-2pp6 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-w23q-4hw3-2pp6 across Go dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.