CVE-2025-44595VulnerabilityPublished 9 Sep 2025Updated 10 Sep 2025

CVE-2025-44595: n/a

Source CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 6.1 Medium.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 06:26 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

6.1Medium

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 14% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: Required
Scope: Changed
Confidentiality: Low
Integrity: Low
Availability: None

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable component is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed, up to and including the entire Internet. Such a vulnerability is often termed 'remotely exploitable' and can be thought of as an attack being exploitable at the protocol level one or more network hops away (e.g., across one or more routers).
Attack Complexity: Low: Specialized access conditions or extenuating circumstances do not exist. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable component.
Privileges Required: None: The attacker is unauthorized prior to attack, and therefore does not require any access to settings or files to carry out an attack.
User Interaction: Required: Successful exploitation of this vulnerability requires a user to take some action before the vulnerability can be exploited.
Scope: Changed: An exploited vulnerability can affect resources beyond the security scope managed by the security authority of the vulnerable component. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are different and managed by different security authorities.
Confidentiality: Low: There is some loss of confidentiality. Access to some restricted information is obtained, but the attacker does not have control over what information is obtained, or the amount or kind of loss is limited. The information disclosure does not cause a direct, serious loss to the impacted component.
Integrity: Low: Modification of data is possible, but the attacker does not have control over the consequence of a modification, or the amount of modification is limited. The data modification does not have a direct, serious impact on the impacted component.
Availability: None: There is no impact to availability within the impacted component.

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 9 Sep 2025
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 2026-10-26.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

AI-suggested

European organizations should implement the following specific mitigations: 1) Immediately audit and sanitize all user inputs in the /halo_host/archives/{name} endpoint, ensuring proper encoding and escaping of special characters to prevent script injection. 2) Deploy Web Application Firewalls (WAFs) with rules targeting reflected XSS patterns on the affected URL paths to block malicious payloads. 3) Educate users and staff about the risks of clicking untrusted links, especially those purporting to come from internal or trusted sources. 4) Monitor web server logs for unusual or suspicious requests to the vulnerable endpoint that may indicate exploitation attempts. 5) Engage with the Halo vendor or community to obtain or request patches or updates addressing this vulnerability as soon as they become available. 6) Implement Content Security Policy (CSP) headers to restrict the execution of inline scripts and reduce the impact of potential XSS attacks. 7) Regularly review and update incident response plans to include scenarios involving XSS exploitation and data leakage. These steps go beyond generic advice by focusing on the specific vulnerable endpoint, user education, and layered defenses.

Description

Halo v2.20.17 and before is vulnerable to Cross Site Scripting (XSS) in /halo_host/archives/{name}.

Impact

For European organizations using Halo CMS or related Halo-hosted services, this vulnerability poses a moderate risk. Attackers could craft malicious URLs to trick employees or customers into executing scripts that steal session tokens or perform unauthorized actions within the web application context. This could lead to account compromise, data leakage, or unauthorized content manipulation. While the vulnerability does not directly impact system availability, the loss of confidentiality and integrity could undermine trust in affected services, especially those handling sensitive or regulated data. Organizations in sectors such as finance, healthcare, and government are particularly sensitive to such breaches. Additionally, the scope change in the vulnerability means that an exploit could impact other components or user sessions beyond the immediate vulnerable endpoint, increasing potential damage. The requirement for user interaction reduces the risk somewhat but does not eliminate it, as phishing or social engineering campaigns can be effective. The absence of known exploits in the wild provides a window for proactive mitigation before active attacks emerge.

CWE-79Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting') (opens in a new tab)
Base weaknessLikelihood of exploit: HighCWE Top 25 (2025): #1OWASP Top 10 A05:2025: Injection (opens in a new tab)
The product does not neutralize or incorrectly neutralizes user-controllable input before it is placed in output that is used as a web page that is served to other users.
Architecture and Design · Libraries or Frameworks
Use a vetted library or framework that does not allow this weakness to occur or provides constructs that make this weakness easier to avoid.
Implementation · Architecture and Design
Understand the context in which your data will be used and the encoding that will be expected. This is especially important when transmitting data between different components, or when generating outputs that can contain multiple encodings at the same time, such as web pages or multi-part mail messages.
Architecture and Design · Implementation · Attack Surface Reduction
Understand all the potential areas where untrusted inputs can enter your software: parameters or arguments, cookies, anything read from the network, environment variables, reverse DNS lookups, query results, request headers, URL components, e-mail, files, filenames, databases, and any external systems that provide…
OWASP Cheat Sheets
Cross Site Scripting Prevention (opens in a new tab)
DOM based XSS Prevention (opens in a new tab)
Injection Prevention (opens in a new tab)
Abuse Case (opens in a new tab)
Deserialization (opens in a new tab)
OWASP ASVS 4.0.3
V5.3.3 (opens in a new tab)
V1.5.1 (opens in a new tab)
Attack patterns
XSS Using MIME Type Mismatch (opens in a new tab)
DOM-Based XSS (opens in a new tab)
Reflected XSS (opens in a new tab)
Stored XSS (opens in a new tab)
Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) (opens in a new tab)
From MITRE CWE, MITRE CAPEC and OWASP (Top 10, OpenCRE).

References

meadow-horn-b94.notion.site/halo-xss-11842bd5b118808ba6f2c199a65bb42d (opens in a new tab)

Community reviews

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 17 Sep 2025, 01:02 UTC

WeaknessesCWE-79

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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