CVE-2026-123638: Gitea · Protection Mechanism Failure
Affects GiteaSource CVE Database V5
Not known to be exploited : upgrade to 28.4.0 soon.
Data as of 15 Nov 2026, 21:35 UTC
Rated High by Threat Radar's AI analysis · CVSS not yet scored by NVD
Thin evidence
One scorer or none- Patch
- Available – fixed in 28.4.0
Exploitation evidence
Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 15 Nov 2026
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponized: 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 15 Nov 2026.
What to do
Upgrade Gitea to 28.4.0.
Affected software
| Product | Affected | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
| Giteagitea.dev | Affected
| Fixed in
|
AI-suggested
Upgrade Gitea to version 28.4.0 or later, where the issue is fixed. The fix changes the pattern matching to use unquoted file names and properly reports renames, restoring the intended protection mechanism. No other mitigation is required once upgraded.
Description
CVE-2026-123638 is a protection mechanism failure in Gitea affecting versions before 28.4.0. The issue arises because the 'Protected file patterns' setting was matched against git-quoted file names, causing files with special characters to bypass protection. This allowed users with write access to modify or rename protected files, potentially adding malicious workflows that execute on repository runners. The flaw is fixed in version 28.4.0 by changing the pattern matching to use unquoted file names and reporting renames with both old and new paths.