CVE-2025-46981
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 · uneditedAdobe Experience Manager versions 6.5.22 and earlier are affected by a stored Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability that could be abused by a low privileged attacker to inject malicious scripts into vulnerable form fields. Malicious JavaScript may be executed in a victim’s browser when they browse to the page containing the vulnerable field.
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 confidenceA stored Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability in Adobe Experience Manager versions 6.5.22 and earlier allows low-privileged attackers to inject malicious JavaScript into vulnerable form fields. The injected payload persists on the affected page and executes in victim users' browsers when they view the compromised 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< 6.5.23.0< 2025.5.0CVSS 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
- 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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Identify the installed Adobe Experience Manager versionAccess the AEM Welcome page or use the Version HUD to view the current AEM version numberAffected if The installed version is earlier than 6.5.23.0 or earlier than 2025.5.0 (for cloud/2025 releases)
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Confirm Forms or form-based content creation is enabledCheck if AEM Forms module or custom form components are installed and accessible to low-privilege users in the environmentAffected if Forms functionality is present and users with standard (low-privilege) permissions can create or edit form content
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Inspect form field configurations for input validation settingsReview the form component configurations in AEM to determine whether server-side input validation and output encoding are properly configured for user-generated form fieldsAffected if Form fields lack proper sanitization or allow HTML/JavaScript input without encoding
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Audit existing user-generated form content for suspicious payloadsUse AEM Query Builder or CRX/DE Lite to search form submission data or content nodes for common XSS patterns such as script tags, event handlers (onerror, onload), or javascript: URIsAffected if Malicious JavaScript payloads are found stored in form field content nodes
Your environment is affected if the AEM version is below 6.5.23.0 or below 2025.5.0 AND Forms allowing user input are in use without proper output encoding.
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.
dbcve · scoped6.5.23.02025.5.0
Apply the vendor patch by updating Adobe Experience Manager to version 6.5.23 or later. Review and sanitize existing user-generated form content to remove any existing malicious scripts.
AEM 6.5.23.0 or AEM 2025.5.0 (depending on current release line)
- Back up the current Adobe Experience Manager instance including repository, database, and configuration files
- Download Adobe Experience Manager 6.5.23.0 (for 6.5.x line) or 2025.5.0 (for newer releases) from the official Adobe distribution portal
- Stop the running AEM instance and any related services
- Install the upgrade following Adobe's standard upgrade procedure for the target version
- After upgrade, verify the AEM instance starts successfully
- Test the form fields that were vulnerable to XSS to confirm the fix is effective
- Review and test custom code or integrations for compatibility with the new version
Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.
- Consultation3.0 h
- Implementation6.0 h
- Testing6.0 h
- Review / QA3.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $4,992.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2025-46981 — 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-2025-46981 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
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- 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