CVE-2025-55751 is a medium-severity vulnerability classified as CWE-601, an Open Redirect flaw found in the HackUCF OnboardLite application. OnboardLite is a platform designed to facilitate the student organization lifecycle at the University of Central Florida. The vulnerability affects versions prior to commit hash 6cca19ea4f47af125caa08ef82594844f039e07e. The issue arises because the application improperly handles the redirect URL parameter, allowing an attacker to craft a malicious link that appears to originate from the trusted OnboardLite domain but redirects users to an untrusted external site. This can be exploited without any authentication or privileges and requires only user interaction (clicking the malicious link). The CVSS 4.0 base score is 5.1, reflecting a network attack vector, low attack complexity, no privileges required, but requiring user interaction. The impact on confidentiality is none, integrity is low, and availability is none, with limited scope. The vulnerability enables phishing attacks, credential theft, malware delivery, and abuse of user trust by leveraging the trusted domain to lure victims. The vendor has addressed this issue starting from the specified commit by implementing JWT signing for the redirect URL parameter, which ensures that only authorized redirects are processed, mitigating the open redirect risk. No known exploits are currently reported in the wild.

For European organizations, the impact of this vulnerability depends largely on whether they use or integrate with HackUCF OnboardLite or similar platforms derived from it. While OnboardLite is primarily targeted at the University of Central Florida, the underlying vulnerability pattern is common and could be present in similar student or organizational lifecycle management applications used in Europe. If exploited, attackers could leverage the trusted domain to conduct phishing campaigns targeting students, staff, or organizational members, potentially leading to credential compromise or malware infections. This could result in unauthorized access to sensitive educational or organizational data, reputational damage, and disruption of student services. The medium severity indicates moderate risk, but the ease of exploitation and the potential for social engineering make it a concern, especially in academic environments or institutions collaborating internationally. Additionally, if European universities or organizations adopt OnboardLite or similar software without patching, they could be directly vulnerable. The lack of known exploits in the wild currently reduces immediate risk but does not eliminate the threat of future exploitation.

1. Immediate upgrade or patching: Organizations using OnboardLite should update to the version including commit 6cca19ea4f47af125caa08ef82594844f039e07e or later, where JWT signing for redirect URLs is implemented. 2. Input validation and URL whitelisting: Ensure that any redirect parameters are strictly validated against a whitelist of trusted domains before processing redirects. 3. User awareness training: Educate users about the risks of clicking on unexpected links, even if they appear to come from trusted domains, to reduce the effectiveness of phishing attempts. 4. Implement Content Security Policy (CSP): Use CSP headers to restrict the domains that can be loaded or navigated to from the application. 5. Monitor logs for unusual redirect patterns or spikes in redirect-related errors that could indicate exploitation attempts. 6. For organizations developing similar applications, adopt secure coding practices for handling redirects, including cryptographic validation of redirect parameters and avoiding open redirects altogether. 7. Employ multi-factor authentication (MFA) to reduce the impact of credential theft resulting from phishing.