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Debian LinuxOperating system · Debian

CVE-2020-22669

CRITICAL · 9.8 CVSS v3.1 Published 2022-09-02
Patch available
A vendor patch is available. No clean upgrade release — apply the published patch.
See remediation →
100/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
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
Modsecurity owasp-modsecurity-crs 3.2.0 (Paranoia level at PL1) has a SQL injection bypass vulnerability. Attackers can use the comment characters and variable assignments in the SQL syntax to bypass Modsecurity WAF protection and implement SQL injection attacks on Web applications.

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
How this class of weakness works · CWE-89

User input is woven into a database query, letting an attacker rewrite the query's logic. From there they can read, alter, or destroy data — frequently the entire database. The reliable fix is parameterised queries (prepared statements), so input is always treated as data and never as SQL.

General guidance for the sql injection class — the official description and references above are authoritative for this specific CVE. Want a bespoke review and a reviewed fix? Ask our team →

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
Debian LinuxOperating system
Affected:= 10.0
Owasp Modsecurity Core Rule SetApplication
Affected:= 3.2.0

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

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
Patch available Apply the vendor patch
Vendor patch github.com →
Recommended fix High confidence

OWASP ModSecurity CRS 3.3.0 or later

  1. Identify the current OWASP ModSecurity Core Rule Set (CRS) version in use by checking the crs-setup.conf file or modsecurity configuration
  2. Upgrade the OWASP CRS to version 3.3.0 or later, which contains the patch for this SQL injection bypass (PR #1793)
  3. If using Debian packages, ensure the Debian 10 system is updated to receive the patched CRS package
  4. After upgrading, verify the new CRS version is loaded by ModSecurity
  5. Test that the previously exploitable SQL injection patterns (using comment characters and variable assignments) are now properly blocked by the updated rules
  6. Review application logs to confirm normal traffic is not being blocked by the new ruleset
Caveat Rule updates may generate new false positives; thorough testing of normal application traffic is recommended after upgrade

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

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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-2020-22669 in production — separate from our analysis above.

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What this is

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What belongs here
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  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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