GhostCMS
CVE-2023-26510
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 · uneditedGhost 5.35.0 allows authorization bypass: contributors can view draft posts of other users, which is arguably inconsistent with a security policy in which a contributor's draft can only be read by editors until published by an editor. NOTE: the vendor's position is that this behavior has no security impact.
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 confidenceGhost 5.35.0 contains an authorization bypass where contributor users can view draft posts belonging to other users. This violates the intended access control policy where contributor drafts should only be readable by editors until publication. The vulnerability stems from insufficient access control checks on draft post resources.
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
GhostCMS
= 5.35.0CVSS 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
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- None
- Availability
- None
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
-
Identify Ghost CMS versionRun `ghost version` in the Ghost installation directory, or check the package.json file for the 'ghost' version entry, or access the site via /ghost/api/admin/settings/ to retrieve the running versionAffected if The installed version is exactly 5.35.0
-
Confirm contributor role is activeNavigate to Staff settings in the Ghost admin panel and verify that at least one user has the 'Contributor' role assignedAffected if Contributor users exist in the system
-
Check for draft posts from other usersAs a contributor user, navigate to the Posts section and attempt to view the list of all posts, or check the database for posts with status='draft' where author_id differs from the current userAffected if Draft posts authored by other users are visible or accessible to the contributor account
-
Verify unauthorized draft accessAs a contributor, attempt to open or retrieve content of a draft post that was created by a different user (different author_id), either via the admin API endpoint /ghost/api/admin/posts/{id}/ or through the frontend draft previewAffected if The contributor can read, view, or retrieve content from another user's draft post despite not being an editor
A user is affected if running Ghost version 5.35.0 with contributor role users who can access draft posts authored by other users.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
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 dataImplement proper role-based access control (RBAC) to ensure contributors can only access their own draft posts, and restrict viewing of other users' drafts to editor roles or above until publication.
Fix this in Ghost
Scoped from the published advisory
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation8.0 h
- Testing6.0 h
- Review / QA4.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $5,536.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2023-26510 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2023-26510 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
Be the first to add a field note for this CVE — a mitigation you’ve verified, a version caveat, or a link to a working fix. Sign in above to contribute.
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.
- 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