Trilium Notes: Authentication Bypass in Clipper API for Electron (Desktop) Builds
- Published
- 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- Where the record stands: published, rejected by its publisher, or superseded by another id.What do these mean?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
- Fix
- Fixed in 0.102.2
- 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
- Exploitation: poc
- Automatable: yes
- Technical impact: partial
Summary
Trilium Notes is a cross-platform, hierarchical note taking application focused on building large personal knowledge bases. In versions 0.102.1 and prior, the Clipper API in Trilium Desktop (v0.101.3) allows full authentication bypass when running in an Electron environment. When Trilium detects an Electron environment, it explicitly disables authentication middleware for the Clipper API, exposing endpoints such as /api/clipper/notes to the network with no password, API token, or CSRF protection. An attacker on a shared network (for example, a corporate LAN or public Wi-Fi) can scan for open high-range ports using a tool like nmap, since Trilium often binds to ports such as 37840. Once a candidate port is found, an unauthenticated request to the Clipper handshake endpoint, which also bypasses authentication, confirms a Trilium instance by returning the application name and protocol version. This facilitates unauthorized data access, phishing, and local system compromise. The issue has been fixed in version 0.102.2.
Timeline
- CVE published
- CISA SSVC assessment
Exploitation: poc · Automatable: yes · Technical impact: partial
- Record last updated
Affected versions
- TriliumNext Trilium
fixed in 0.102.2