VulnerabilityPublished 20 Jan 2026

CVE-2026-21642: Revive Adserver · Cross-site Scripting

Affects Revive AdserverSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 6.1 Medium.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 10:12 UTC

CVSS 3.0 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 9% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:3.0/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 20 Jan 2026
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 26 Oct 2026.

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 or the CVSS exploit maturity 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

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
ReviveRevive Adserver	Affected >=6 <=6.0.4	Fixed in–

AI-suggested

Immediately apply any available patches or updates from Revive Adserver addressing this vulnerability once released.
If patches are not yet available, implement web application firewall (WAF) rules to detect and block suspicious requests containing script tags or unusual parameters targeting banner-acl.php and channel-acl.php.
Educate administrators about the risk of clicking untrusted URLs, especially those received via email or messaging platforms, to reduce the likelihood of social engineering exploitation.
Enforce multi-factor authentication (MFA) for administrative accounts to limit the impact of stolen credentials.
Review and restrict administrative access to trusted networks or VPNs to reduce exposure.
Monitor logs for unusual access patterns or repeated requests to the vulnerable scripts.
Implement Content Security Policy (CSP) headers to limit the execution of unauthorized scripts in the browser.
Regularly audit and sanitize all user inputs and URL parameters in custom deployments or plugins related to Revive Adserver. These steps collectively reduce the risk of exploitation until a vendor patch is applied.

Description

CVE-2026-21642 is a reflected Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability found in Revive Adserver version 6, specifically in the banner-acl.php and channel-acl.php scripts. An attacker can craft a malicious URL containing HTML/JavaScript payloads that, when visited by a logged-in administrator, executes arbitrary scripts in their browser. This vulnerability requires user interaction (administrator clicking the URL) but does not require prior authentication to trigger the malicious URL. The CVSS 3.0 base score is 6.1 (medium severity), reflecting limited confidentiality and integrity impact but no availability impact. No known exploits are currently reported in the wild. European organizations using Revive Adserver 6 should prioritize patching or mitigating this issue to prevent potential administrative account compromise or session hijacking.

Impact

For European organizations, this vulnerability poses a risk primarily to the confidentiality and integrity of administrative sessions within Revive Adserver. Successful exploitation could allow attackers to hijack administrator sessions, steal credentials, or perform unauthorized administrative actions such as modifying ad campaigns or redirecting ad traffic. This can lead to financial loss, reputational damage, and potential data leakage. Since Revive Adserver is used by many digital marketing and advertising companies, media agencies, and publishers across Europe, the impact could disrupt advertising operations and compromise sensitive business data. The reflected XSS nature means the attack requires social engineering to trick administrators into clicking malicious links, but once successful, the attacker gains significant control. The vulnerability does not affect availability directly but can indirectly cause service disruption if administrative controls are compromised. Given the medium CVSS score and the administrative level targeted, the impact is moderate but non-negligible, especially for organizations heavily reliant on digital advertising infrastructure.

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

hackerone.com/reports/3470970 (opens in a new tab)

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 28 Jan 2026, 20:21 UTC

WeaknessesCWE-79

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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