CVE-2023-23616 Discourse membership requests lack character limit
Attackers can submit unlimited-length membership requests to bloat the database, potentially causing resource exhaustion in Discourse forums.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- Any signed-in user
- Attackable
- Over the internet
- Victim action needed
- A user has to click or open something
- Fix
- Available
What is CVE-2023-23616?
CVE-2023-23616 is a low-severity denial of service vulnerability in Discourse Discourse, published on 27 Jan 2023. Any signed-in user can exploit it over the network, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.
Official description
Discourse is an open-source discussion platform. Prior to version 3.0.1 on the `stable` branch and 3.1.0.beta2 on the `beta` and `tests-passed` branches, when submitting a membership request, there is no character limit for the reason provided with the request. This could potentially allow a user to flood the database with a large amount of data. However it is unlikely this could be used as part of a DoS attack, as the paths reading back the reasons are only available to administrators. Starting in version 3.0.1 on the `stable` branch and 3.1.0.beta2 on the `beta` and `tests-passed` branches, a limit of 280 characters has been introduced for membership requests.
Weakness: CWE-400
Which versions are affected by CVE-2023-23616?
1 open source package ship an affected version, including discourse. It affects 1 product.
| Package | Affected | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
discourse Bitnami | All versions | 3.0.1 |
Products include Discourse Discourse.
How do I fix CVE-2023-23616?
Upgrade discourse to 3.0.1 or later.
Upgrade, then put limits on request size, rate and nesting depth so one client cannot exhaust the service. More about Denial of service.
Is CVE-2023-23616 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-23616 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Other vulnerabilities in Discourse Discourse
- CVE-2021-41163 RCE via malicious SNS subscription payload
- CVE-2022-36066 Discourse vulnerable to RCE via admins uploading maliciously zipped file
- CVE-2022-39356 Discourse user account takeover via email and invite link
- CVE-2023-22468 Discourse vulnerable to Cross-site Scripting in local oneboxes
- CVE-2026-27934 Discourse leaks private topic title and post excerpt via user action API endpoint
Sources
Also known as BIT-discourse-2023-23616, GHSA-6xff-p329-9pgf.