Search GuardApplication

CVE-2019-13419

HIGH · 7.5 CVSS v3.0 Published 2019-08-13
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to 23.1 or later.
See remediation →
84/100
Remediation priority · High
Remotely reachable No privileges Zero-click

Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.

NVD · unedited
Search Guard versions before 23.1 had an issue that for aggregations clear text values of anonymised fields were leaked.

Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.

dbcve analysis · high confidence

Search Guard versions before 23.1 had an authentication bypass vulnerability where Elasticsearch aggregations would leak clear text values of fields that should have been anonymized. This exposed sensitive data that was intended to be hidden from users.

MitigationUpgrade Search Guard to version 23.1 or later to remediate the anonymization bypass in aggregation results.

Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.

Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.

NVD · CPE data
Search GuardApplication
Affected:< 23.1

CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.

From the vector
Attack vector
Network
Complexity
Low
Privileges
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
None
Availability
None

CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N

Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.

dbcve checks

Work through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.

  1. Check installed Search Guard version
    Query the Search Guard version endpoint or check the Search Guard plugin JAR file version in the Elasticsearch plugins directory
    Affected if The installed version is any version before 23.1 (e.g., 23.0, 22.0, 21.x, etc.)
  2. Identify if Search Guard anonymization is configured
    Review Search Guard configuration files (sg_config.yml or similar) for anonymization settings that define which fields should be anonymized in aggregation results
    Affected if Anonymization rules are defined for any fields that are used in aggregations
  3. Verify aggregation usage on sensitive fields
    Examine your Elasticsearch queries and dashboards that perform aggregations on fields configured for anonymization
    Affected if Aggregations are executed on fields that should be anonymized but may be returning clear text values
  4. Review aggregation response data
    Capture and inspect actual aggregation query responses from your Search Guard-protected cluster to observe if field values appear as plaintext instead of anonymized
    Affected if Aggregation results show clear text values for fields that should have been anonymized

You are affected if Search Guard version is below 23.1 AND anonymization is configured for fields used in aggregations, with aggregation results showing plaintext instead of anonymized values.

Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.

Check your environment

Paste your version and any relevant configuration and it will be compared against the affected criteria above. Do not include secrets or credentials.

AI-assisted, checked against the advisory. Informational, not a guarantee.

Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.

From vendor data
Upgrade available Upgrade to 23.1 or later
Fixed in 23.1
Interim mitigation

Upgrade Search Guard to version 23.1 or later to remediate the anonymization bypass in aggregation results.

Fix this in Search Guard Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation2.0 h
  • Testing4.0 h
  • Review / QA2.0 h
10.0 hours of engineering $1,720
Get the upgrade done

An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $2,752.

Scan for this in your stack

Free · runs locally
dbcve dependency scanner

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References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.

Primary sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2019-13419 in production — separate from our analysis above.

No notes yet

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What this is

A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.

What belongs here
  • Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
  • No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
  • No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data