CVE-2020-8920 Overoptimization leads to private information leak in Gerrit

What is CVE-2020-8920?

CVE-2020-8920 is a low-severity missing authorization vulnerability in Gerrit, published on 10 Dec 2020. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

Official description

An information leak vulnerability exists in Gerrit versions prior to 2.14.22, 2.15.21, 2.16.25, 3.0.15, 3.1.10, 3.2.5 where an overoptimization with the FilteredRepository wrapper skips the verification of access on All-Users repositories, allowing an attacker to get read access to all users' personal information associated with their accounts.

Weakness: CWE-285

Which versions are affected by CVE-2020-8920?

12 open source packages ship an affected version, including com.google.gerrit:gerrit-plugin-api. It affects 1 product.

Products include Google Gerrit.

How do I fix CVE-2020-8920?

Upgrade com.google.gerrit:gerrit-plugin-api to a fixed version for your release line: 2.14.22, 2.15.21, 2.16.25 or 3.0.15.

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

Is CVE-2020-8920 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2020-8920 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Other vulnerabilities in Gerrit

• CVE-2021-22553 Heap Memory exhaustion in Gerrit Medium 6.5
• CVE-2026-2725 Improper Authorization in Gerrit allowing Code Review Bypass via "Submitted Together" Medium 6.0
• CVE-2020-8919 Information leakage in Gerrit Low 3.5

Sources

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

Also known as GHSA-g5q2-cxgq-h2rw.