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Description ColumnApplication · Jenkins

CVE-2020-2266

MEDIUM · 5.4 CVSS v3.1 Published 2020-09-16
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to after 1.3 or later.
See remediation →
58/100
Remediation priority · Elevated
Remotely reachable

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
Jenkins Description Column Plugin 1.3 and earlier does not escape the job description in the column tooltip, resulting in a stored cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability exploitable by attackers with Job/Configure permission.

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

The Jenkins Description Column Plugin versions 1.3 and earlier fails to sanitize job descriptions before displaying them in column tooltips. Attackers with Job/Configure permission can inject malicious JavaScript code into the job description field, which executes when users view the column tooltip, resulting in a stored cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability.

MitigationUpdate the Description Column Plugin to version 1.4 or later which contains the fix. As an interim measure, restrict Job/Configure permission to trusted users only and review existing job configurations for suspicious content.

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
Description ColumnApplication
Affected:<= 1.3

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
Low
User interaction
Required
Scope
Changed
Confidentiality
Low
Integrity
Low
Availability
None

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:C/C:L/I:L/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. Verify Description Column Plugin is installed
    Go to Jenkins > Manage Jenkins > Manage Plugins > Installed and search for 'Description Column' plugin. Alternatively, check the JENKINS_HOME/plugins directory for the description-column plugin folder.
    Affected if The Description Column plugin is present in the Jenkins instance.
  2. Determine the installed version of Description Column Plugin
    In Jenkins > Manage Jenkins > Manage Plugins > Installed, locate Description Column and check the Version column. Or examine the plugin's manifest file (META-INF/MANIFEST.MF) inside the description-column.hpi file in the plugins directory.
    Affected if The version is 1.3 or earlier.
  3. Identify users with Job/Configure permission
    Review Jenkins authorization matrix or security realm settings. Check which users or groups have the 'Job/Configure' permission at the global or folder level by navigating to Manage Jenkins > Configure Global Security or checking folder-level permissions.
    Affected if Any untrusted or non-admin users possess Job/Configure permission.
  4. Inspect job descriptions for suspicious content
    Review job configurations: for each job, go to Configure and examine the 'Description' field. Alternatively, use the Jenkins script console to query all job descriptions: Jenkins.instance.allItems.collect { it.description }. Look for HTML tags, script elements, event handlers (onload, onclick, etc.), or encoded payloads.
    Affected if Any job description contains unsanitized HTML, script tags, or JavaScript code.
  5. Confirm column tooltip display behavior
    Navigate to a Jenkins view that includes the Description Column. Hover over the description column entries for various jobs and observe if the tooltip displays the raw job description content.
    Affected if The Description Column plugin is in use on a view and tooltips render job descriptions without visible sanitization.

The environment is affected if the Description Column Plugin version 1.3 or earlier is installed AND untrusted users have Job/Configure permission AND malicious content exists in job descriptions displayed via column tooltips.

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 a release after 1.3
Interim mitigation

Update the Description Column Plugin to version 1.4 or later which contains the fix. As an interim measure, restrict Job/Configure permission to trusted users only and review existing job configurations for suspicious content.

Fix this in Description Column Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation1.0 h
  • Implementation1.0 h
  • Testing2.0 h
  • Review / QA1.0 h
5.0 hours of engineering $860
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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-2020-2266 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
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