CVE-2016-3165 Drupal Form API ignores access restrictions on submit buttons

What is CVE-2016-3165?

CVE-2016-3165 is a high-severity missing authorization vulnerability in Drupal Drupal, published on 12 Apr 2016. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

Official description

The Form API in Drupal 6.x before 6.38 ignores access restrictions on submit buttons, which might allow remote attackers to bypass intended access restrictions by leveraging permission to submit a form with a button that has "#access" set to FALSE in the server-side form definition.

Weakness: CWE-284

Which versions are affected by CVE-2016-3165?

4 open source packages ship an affected version, including drupal/core and drupal/drupal. It affects 1 product.

Products include Drupal Drupal.

How do I fix CVE-2016-3165?

Upgrade drupal/core to 6.38 or later.

Upgrade, and check permissions on every request on the server, not only in the interface. More about Missing authorization.

Is CVE-2016-3165 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2016-3165 in the wild and no public exploit code.

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• CVE-2026-9082 Drupal Core SQL Injection Exploited Critical 9.8
• CVE-2020-13671 Drupal core Un-restricted Upload of File Exploited High 8.8
• CVE-2019-6340 Drupal Core Remote Code Execution Exploited High 8.1
• CVE-2009-3352 Other in n/a Critical 10.0
• CVE-2024-55636 Drupal core - Less critical - Gadget chain - SA-CORE-2024-006 Critical 9.8

All Drupal Drupal vulnerabilities

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as GHSA-4gh5-3hqj-x3pj.