GHSA-jx35-x7fj-vgpr BIT-ghost-2026-53949 CVE-2026-53949
Ghost Content API filter bypass reveals private fields
- Severity
- 5.3 / 10
- Medium · CVSS 3.1
- Exploit chance (EPSS)
- 0.36%
- Chance of exploitation in the next 30 days. Higher than 29.57% of scored vulnerabilities.
- Known exploited
- No
- Not in CISA's catalog
- Weakness
- CWE-200 Exposure of Sensitive Information to an Unauthorized Actor
- CWE-693 Protection Mechanism Failure
- Fix
6.21.2- Upgrade ghost to this version or later
Description
Impact
The validation applied to filters on the public API endpoints could be partially bypassed, making it possible to reveal private fields via a brute force attack. If SQLite was used as the database password hashes were fully accessible. If MySQL was used as the database the password hashes' case (uppercase / lowercase) would have been lost, which would likely have rendered a further brute force attack on the discovered hashes fruitless.
Vulnerable versions
This vulnerability is present in Ghost from v5.46.1 up to v6.21.1.
Patches
v6.21.2 contains a fix for this issue.
How to update
For self-hosters using Docker, find Docker's official Ghost image here. Updating a Docker-based Ghost instance is documented here.
If your Ghost is a Ghost-CLI install see our documentation on updating it to the latest version here.
Workarounds
If upgrading immediately is not possible, block or filter requests to Content API endpoints where the filter query parameter contains password or email (including any compound form such as users.password, users.email, authors.password, authors.email). Reject requests at a reverse proxy / WAF layer before they reach Ghost.
Example (case-insensitive) pattern to block on the raw querystring:
filter=[^&]*(password|email)
References
Ghost thanks crnkovic for disclosing this vulnerability responsibly.
For more information
If you have any questions or comments about this advisory, email Ghost at security@ghost.org.
Affected versions
npm
| Package | Vulnerable | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
| ghost | >= 5.46.1, < 6.21.2 |
6.21.2 |
How to fix
Move to the fixed version or later with your package manager, update the lockfile, and run your tests. If the package only arrives through another dependency, upgrade that dependency first. If none of its releases pulls a fixed version yet, force the version with your package manager's override.
ghost npm → 6.21.2
- npm
npm install ghost@6.21.2- yarn
yarn add ghost@6.21.2- pnpm
pnpm add ghost@6.21.2
Severity breakdown
CVSS 3.1 5.3
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:N/A:N
- Attack vector
- Network
- Attack complexity
- Low
- Privileges required
- None
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- Low
- Integrity
- None
- Availability
- None
Weakness
CWE-200: Exposure of Sensitive Information to an Unauthorized Actor
The product exposes sensitive information to an actor that is not explicitly authorized to have access to that information.
How to prevent it
- Architecture and Design: Compartmentalize the system to have "safe" areas where trust boundaries can be unambiguously drawn. Do not allow sensitive data to go outside of the trust boundary and always be careful when interfacing with a compartment outside of the safe area. Ensure that appropriate compartmentalization is built into the system design, and the compartmentalization allows for and reinforces privilege separation functionality. Architects and designers should rely on the principle of least privilege to decide the appropriate time to use privileges and the time to drop privileges.
CWE-693: Protection Mechanism Failure
The product does not use or incorrectly uses a protection mechanism that provides sufficient defense against directed attacks against the product.
References
Advisories
Packages
Other links
Timeline
- Published
- Last updated by the source
- Latest EPSS score
Related advisories
| Advisory | Severity | Why it's related |
|---|---|---|
| GHSA-x3mg-q38v-m562 Ghost: Authorization Issue Allowed Author Role to Delete any Post | Medium | Also affects ghost |
| GHSA-8575-cr6v-7jh4 Ghost: Stored XSS via SVG Uploads Bypassing Sanitization | High | Also affects ghost |
| GHSA-r7f2-6fj8-6fg2 Ghost: Private IP Filtering Bypass via IPv6 Transition Addresses | Medium | Also affects ghost |
| GHSA-322m-ff4g-9vx9 Ghost: Server-Side Request Forgery in Bookmark Fetching | Medium | Also affects ghost |
| GHSA-fwh9-qg68-vxp4 Ghost: Regular Expression Denial of Service in Content Import | Medium | Also affects ghost |
| GHSA-9m4w-fmjw-fvjq Ghost: Regular Expression Denial of Service in External Media Inliner | Medium | Also affects ghost |
| GHSA-hqq2-xqr2-fmx2 Ghost : Stored XSS via SVG Files in Content Imports | Medium | Also affects ghost |
| GHSA-69qc-f5m6-889c Ghost: Stored XSS via Embed Card Previews | High | Also affects ghost |
MergeHarbor checks every repository's dependencies against this database, ranks what matters by exploitability and reachability, routes it to the owning team and opens the fix pull request.
Check your repos with MergeHarbor