CVE-2020-7961 Liferay Portal Deserialization of Untrusted Data

What is CVE-2020-7961?

CVE-2020-7961 is a critical unsafe deserialization vulnerability in Liferay Liferay Portal, published on 20 Mar 2020. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

Official description

Deserialization of Untrusted Data in Liferay Portal prior to 7.2.1 CE GA2 allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via JSON web services (JSONWS).

Weakness: CWE-502

Which versions are affected by CVE-2020-7961?

2 open source packages ship an affected version, including com.liferay.portal:com.liferay.portal.kernel. It affects 1 product.

Products include Liferay Liferay Portal.

How do I fix CVE-2020-7961?

Upgrade com.liferay.portal:com.liferay.portal.kernel to 4.35.3 or later. US federal agencies must fix it by 3 May 2022.

Upgrade, and only deserialise data from trusted sources or with an allow-list of types. More about Unsafe deserialization.

Is CVE-2020-7961 being exploited?

Yes. Attackers have exploited CVE-2020-7961 in the wild since at least 3 Nov 2021.

Public exploit code: 1 Metasploit module, 1 Exploit-DB entry, 1 Nuclei template and 10 proofs of concept on GitHub.

Other vulnerabilities in Liferay Liferay Portal

• CVE-2021-33990 File upload in n/a Critical 9.8
• CVE-2019-16891 Liferay Portal Allows RCE via Deserialization of a JSON Payload Critical 9.8
• CVE-2023-47797 Liferay Portal XSS with `p_l_back_url_title` on edit content page Critical 9.6
• CVE-2020-13445 Liferay Portal and Liferay DXP Vulnerable to Arbitrary Code Execution High 8.8
• CVE-2018-10795 File upload in n/a High 8.8

All Liferay Liferay Portal vulnerabilities

Sources

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

Also known as GHSA-w7pm-cc4v-f3g8.