This vulnerability affects all Kirby sites that use the pages field and where users of a particular role have no permission to access pages (pages.access permission is disabled). This can be due to configuration in the user blueprint(s), options in the model blueprint(s), or a combination of both settings.
It was possible to confirm the existence of arbitrary pages and to retrieve the value of the title field of the pages found.
The vulnerability can only be exploited by authenticated users. Write actions are not affected by this vulnerability.
Missing authorization allows authenticated users to perform actions they are not intended to have access to.
The effects of missing authorization can include unauthorized access to sensitive information as well as unauthorized changes to content or system information.
Kirby's user permissions control which user role is allowed to perform specific actions on content models in the CMS. These permissions are defined for each role in the user blueprint (site/blueprints/users/...). It is also possible to customize the permissions for each target model in the model blueprints (such as in site/blueprints/pages/...) using the options feature. The permissions and options together control the authorization of user actions.
Kirby provides the pages.access and pages.list permissions (among others). The list permission controls whether affected models appear in lists throughout the Panel and REST API. The access permission has the same effect but also disables direct access to the affected models.
This vulnerability affects the backend logic for the page picker that is used in the pages field to select pages. The picker is opened based on a user-provided parent page or the site model.
In affected releases, the backend logic did not validate that the user-provided parent page or site was accessible to the current user. This allowed authenticated attackers with knowledge of the full path to an existing page to confirm the existence of a particular page and to retrieve the value of the title field of that page. This could lead to the disclosure of sensitive information.
The problem has been patched in Kirby 4.9.4 and Kirby 5.4.4. Please update to one of these or a later version to fix the vulnerability.
In all of the mentioned releases, we have added a check verifying that the requested parent page or site is accessible to the current user before returning the picker data.
| Software | From | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
getkirby / cms
|
- | 4.9.4 |
getkirby / cms
|
5.0.0-alpha.1 | 5.4.4 |
A security vulnerability is a weakness in software, hardware, or configuration that can be exploited to compromise confidentiality, integrity, or availability. Many vulnerabilities are tracked as CVEs (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures), which provide a standardized identifier so teams can coordinate patching, mitigation, and risk assessment across tools and vendors.
CVSS (Common Vulnerability Scoring System) estimates technical severity, but it doesn't automatically equal business risk. Prioritize using context like internet exposure, affected asset criticality, known exploitation (proof-of-concept or in-the-wild), and whether compensating controls exist. A "Medium" CVSS on an exposed, production system can be more urgent than a "Critical" on an isolated, non-production host.
A vulnerability is the underlying weakness. An exploit is the method or code used to take advantage of it. A zero-day is a vulnerability that is unknown to the vendor or has no publicly available fix when attackers begin using it. In practice, risk increases sharply when exploitation becomes reliable or widespread.
Recurring findings usually come from incomplete Asset Discovery, inconsistent patch management, inherited images, and configuration drift. In modern environments, you also need to watch the software supply chain: dependencies, containers, build pipelines, and third-party services can reintroduce the same weakness even after you patch a single host. Unknown or unmanaged assets (often called Shadow IT) are a common reason the same issues resurface.
Use a simple, repeatable triage model: focus first on externally exposed assets, high-value systems (identity, VPN, email, production), vulnerabilities with known exploits, and issues that enable remote code execution or privilege escalation. Then enforce patch SLAs and track progress using consistent metrics so remediation is steady, not reactive.
SynScan combines attack surface monitoring and continuous security auditing to keep your inventory current, flag high-impact vulnerabilities early, and help you turn raw findings into a practical remediation plan.