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Actively exploited in the wild. This CVE is on the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities list — treat remediation as urgent. Federal remediation due by 3 May 2022.
StrutsFramework / library · Apache

CVE-2020-17530

CRITICAL · 9.8 CVSS v3.1 Published 2020-12-11
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to 2.5.30 or later.
See remediation →
100/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
In the wild High EPSS Public exploit Remotely reachable No privileges Zero-click Patch available

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
Forced OGNL evaluation, when evaluated on raw user input in tag attributes, may lead to remote code execution. Affected software : Apache Struts 2.0.0 - Struts 2.5.25.

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

Apache Struts 2.0.0 through 2.5.25 contains a critical OGNL injection vulnerability where forced evaluation of raw user input in tag attributes allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code by injecting malicious OGNL expressions.

MitigationUpgrade to Apache Struts 2.5.26 or later, and audit codebase to ensure user input is never directly evaluated in OGNL contexts within tag attributes.

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
StrutsFramework / library
Affected:>= 2.0.0, < 2.5.30
Business IntelligenceApplication
Affected:= 12.2.1.3.0= 12.2.1.4.0
Communications Diameter Intelligence HubApplication
Affected:= 8.0.0= 8.1.0= 8.2.0= 8.2.3
Communications Policy ManagementApplication
Affected:= 12.5.0
Communications Pricing Design CenterApplication
Affected:= 12.0.0.3.0
Financial Services Data Integration HubApplication
Affected:= 8.0.3= 8.0.6
Hospitality Opera 5Application
Affected:= 5.6
Mysql Enterprise MonitorDatabase / datastore
Affected:= 8.0.23

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
High
Availability
High

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

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. Identify Apache Struts 2 version
    Locate the struts2-core JAR file in your application WEB-INF/lib directory and inspect its MANIFEST.MF file, or check your build artifacts/pom.xml for the struts2-core dependency version.
    Affected if The version is 2.0.0 or higher but below 2.5.30.
  2. Check for Oracle Business Intelligence installation
    Query the Oracle BI installation directory or check the Oracle inventory file (oraInst.loc) for Oracle Business Intelligence version 12.2.1.3.0 or 12.2.1.4.0.
    Affected if Oracle Business Intelligence versions 12.2.1.3.0 or 12.2.1.4.0 are installed.
  3. Check for other affected Oracle products
    Review installed Oracle product versions in your environment, specifically checking for: Communications Diameter Intelligence Hub (8.0.0, 8.1.0, 8.2.0, 8.2.3), Communications Policy Management (12.5.0), Communications Pricing Design Center (12.0.0.3.0), Financial Services Data Integration Hub (8.0.3, 8.0.6), Hospitality Opera 5 (5.6), or Mysql Enterprise Monitor (8.0.23).
    Affected if Any of these specific Oracle product versions are installed.
  4. Inspect JSP and template files for vulnerable tag attribute patterns
    Search your application source code for Struts 2 tag attributes that directly reference user input parameters, such as %{paramName} or ${paramName} constructs within Struts tags like <s:property>, <s:text>, or similar tags where request parameters are evaluated as OGNL.
    Affected if Raw user-supplied input from HttpServletRequest parameters is directly used within OGNL evaluation contexts in tag attributes.

Your environment is affected if Apache Struts 2 version is below 2.5.30, or if any listed Oracle products with those specific versions are installed, AND your application uses unvalidated user input in Struts 2 tag attributes that get evaluated as OGNL expressions.

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.

dbcve · scoped
Upgrade available Upgrade to 2.5.30 or later
Fixed in 2.5.30
Vendor patch security.netapp.com →
Interim mitigation

Upgrade to Apache Struts 2.5.26 or later, and audit codebase to ensure user input is never directly evaluated in OGNL contexts within tag attributes.

Recommended fix High confidence

Apache Struts 2.5.30 or later (e.g., 2.5.30, 2.6.x stable release)

  1. 1. Identify all applications and services using Apache Struts 2.x libraries in your environment
  2. 2. Confirm the current Struts version in use (check pom.xml, lib folders, or application metadata)
  3. 3. Download Apache Struts 2.5.30 or a later stable release from the official Apache Struts distribution repository (struts.apache.org)
  4. 4. Replace all vulnerable Struts 2 core libraries (struts2-core-x.x.x.jar) with the fixed version (2.5.30 or later) across all affected applications
  5. 5. Rebuild and recompile any applications that have Struts as a dependency
  6. 6. Test all applications to ensure functionality is preserved after the upgrade
  7. 7. Redeploy the updated applications to all production environments
  8. 8. Verify that the OGNL evaluation is no longer forced on raw user input in tag attributes
Caveat Minor API changes may exist between major versions; review the Struts migration guide for 2.5.x changes and test thoroughly before production deployment

Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.

Fix this in Struts Exploited in the wild — priority engagement
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  • Implementation8.0 h
  • Testing8.0 h
  • Review / QA4.0 h
24.0 hours of engineering $4,160
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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-2020-17530 in production — separate from our analysis above.

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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