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Travis CiApplication

CVE-2021-41077

HIGH · 7.5 CVSS v3.1 Published 2021-09-14
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to after 2021-09-10 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
The activation process in Travis CI, for certain 2021-09-03 through 2021-09-10 builds, causes secret data to have unexpected sharing that is not specified by the customer-controlled .travis.yml file. In particular, the desired behavior (if .travis.yml has been created locally by a customer, and added to git) is for a Travis service to perform builds in a way that prevents public access to customer-specific secret environment data such as signing keys, access credentials, and API tokens. However, during the stated 8-day interval, secret data could be revealed to an unauthorized actor who forked a public repository and printed files during a build process.

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 · moderate confidence

During an 8-day window (2021-09-03 to 2021-09-10), Travis CI had a flaw in their activation process that caused customer-controlled secret environment variables (API tokens, signing keys, credentials) to be exposed to forked builds of public repositories, bypassing the intended access controls specified in .travis.yml.

MitigationOrganizations should audit Travis CI build logs from September 3-10, 2021, identify any secrets used in builds during that window, and proactively rotate all potentially exposed credentials including API tokens, signing keys, and access tokens.

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
Travis CiApplication
Affected:>= 2021-09-03, <= 2021-09-10

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:3.1/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. Review Travis CI build history for the affected window
    Log into Travis CI and navigate to your repository build history. Filter or search for builds that ran between September 3, 2021 and September 10, 2021. Note the build numbers, commit SHAs, and trigger sources (e.g., push, pull request).
    Affected if Any builds were executed during September 3-10, 2021
  2. Identify pull request builds from forks
    In the build history, examine the event type for builds in the affected window. Look specifically for builds triggered by pull requests (PR) where the source branch comes from a fork (indicated by a different repository name/owner in the PR title or branch name).
    Affected if Pull request builds from forked repositories occurred during the affected window
  3. Check for secret variable usage in potentially affected builds
    Review the build log for each identified fork build. Look for any appearance of environment variable values that were marked as 'secure' or 'encrypted' in your .travis.yml, such as API tokens, keys, or credentials. Use the Travis CI web UI to view environment variables displayed in build logs.
    Affected if Secret environment variables were used in fork builds during the window
  4. Verify .travis.yml security settings
    Examine your .travis.yml configuration file in the repository, particularly the 'env' section with 'secure:' variables, and check for 'if: type = pull_request' conditions or lack thereof. Determine whether secure variables were set to be available in pull request builds.
    Affected if Secure environment variables were configured and available to pull request (fork) builds

If your repository had any pull request builds from forks between September 3-10, 2021 that used secret environment variables, those secrets were likely exposed to the fork builds.

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 2021-09-10
Interim mitigation

Organizations should audit Travis CI build logs from September 3-10, 2021, identify any secrets used in builds during that window, and proactively rotate all potentially exposed credentials including API tokens, signing keys, and access tokens.

Fix this in Travis Ci Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation1.0 h
  • Testing2.0 h
  • Review / QA1.0 h
6.0 hours of engineering $1,060
Get the upgrade done

An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $1,696.

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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-2021-41077 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