Overview
The GitLab CE/EE environment has been discovered to have a notable vulnerability that could potentially compromise systems and lead to data leakage. This vulnerability, identified as CVE-2025-6454, affects multiple versions of the GitLab software, and its severity underscores the importance of immediate mitigation. This issue is particularly impactful as it targets a widely used platform, GitLab, which is a critical tool for developers worldwide. The far-reaching implications of this vulnerability make it a matter of paramount concern for cybersecurity professionals, system administrators, and organizations that rely on GitLab for their operations.
Vulnerability Summary
CVE ID: CVE-2025-6454
Severity: High (8.5 CVSS Score)
Attack Vector: Network
Privileges Required: User
User Interaction: Required
Impact: Potential system compromise and data leakage
Affected Products
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Product | Affected Versions
GitLab CE | 16.11-18.1.5, 18.2-18.2.5, 18.3-18.3.1
GitLab EE | 16.11-18.1.5, 18.2-18.2.5, 18.3-18.3.1
How the Exploit Works
The vulnerability CVE-2025-6454 allows authenticated users to inject carefully crafted sequences into the system through proxy environments. This exploitation can lead to unintended internal requests in the GitLab CE/EE environment that can potentially compromise the system or lead to data leakage. This vulnerability is especially concerning because the exploit can be triggered by any authenticated user, not just those with higher-level privileges.
Conceptual Example Code
The following is a
conceptual
example of how the vulnerability might be exploited. This example shows how an authenticated user might send a malicious payload to a vulnerable endpoint in the GitLab environment.
POST /vulnerable/endpoint HTTP/1.1
Host: target.example.com
Content-Type: application/json
{
"injected_sequence": "Crafted sequence here..."
}Mitigation Guidance
In order to mitigate this vulnerability, it is recommended to apply the vendor patch as soon as possible. If immediate patching is not feasible, using a Web Application Firewall (WAF) or Intrusion Detection System (IDS) can serve as temporary mitigation. However, these should only be considered as temporary solutions; applying the vendor patch should always be the ultimate goal to fully resolve the vulnerability. Regularly updating software to the latest version is also a good preventive measure against such vulnerabilities.
