Gitea OAuth2 account auto-linking takeover through the sign-up form
Written by anthropic/claude-haiku-5.5 from the sources below. Verify against them.
- Last modified
- Where the record stands: published, rejected by its publisher, or superseded by another id.What do these mean? →
- Published
- Whether CISA lists it in its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog: proof that attackers are using it.What do these mean? →
- Not listed in CISA KEV
- A 0-100 score for how much a CVE matters across the industry: exploitation, exposure, how widely the software is used, severity and whether a fix exists.What do these mean? →
- 0/100 · provisional
- How many real-world setups can hit the bug, from the vendor's advisory and CISA data. It does not know your setup.What do these mean? →
- Unclear
- Fix
- Fixed in 28.3.0
- Whether working attack code is public (Exploit-DB, Metasploit, Nuclei or GitHub). Public code makes attacks easier.What do these mean? →
- None on Exploit-DB, Metasploit or GitHub
Summary
Gitea, the self-hosted Git service, is affected when its OAuth2 account auto-linking option is enabled alongside open registration. An attacker with an account on a configured OAuth2 provider could take over another user's Gitea account, including an administrator account, without knowing its password, and the takeover would persist for later sign-ins.
Read the original description
When `[oauth2_client].ACCOUNT_LINKING` is set to `auto` (not the default) and registration is enabled, the link-account sign-up form looked up the existing account to link by the user name or email submitted in the form instead of the identity asserted by the OAuth2 provider. An attacker with an account on a configured OAuth2 provider could submit another user's name, link their external identity to that Gitea account and be signed in as it without its password, including as an administrator. The link persisted for later sign-ins. Automatic linking now only happens when the existing account matches the provider's email or provider-derived user name; otherwise the account password is required.
What to do
Upgrade to a fixed version: 28.3.0.
Timeline
- CVE published
- First seen by cve.now
Affected versions
- gitea.dev
fixed in 28.3.0
Evidence 5
- Advisory
- Patch
- Patch
- Repository
- Link
Corrections
None so far.
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Questions about CVE-2026-120263
What should I do about it?
Upgrade Gitea to version 28.3.0 or later, which contains the patch. The advisory gives no workaround for this issue.Source: github.com
Is it being exploited?
It is not in CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog, and CISA's SSVC assessment does not mark exploitation as active. That does not mean it has not been attacked: vendors and researchers can report attacks before CISA lists them. No public exploit code is tracked.Source: cve.now feed data