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Product Name: JHipster Platform
Vulnerability: Privilege Escalation via Response Manipulation
Vulnerable Versions: Up to 8.9.0
CVE: CVE-2025-43712
Discovered by: Hritik Godara, FireCompass Research Team
Researchers from the FireCompass Security Team discovered a privilege escalation vulnerability in the JHipster Platform (up to v8.9.0). The issue was identified in how the application processes authentication responses—specifically, improper server-side validation of user roles allowed attackers to manipulate the response and gain unauthorized elevated privileges.
Technical Breakdown
How Was It Discovered?
The FireCompass Security Team identified the issue during a manual analysis of the authentication flow. When a user authenticates, the platform responds with a user profile object that includes assigned roles (e.g., ROLE_USER). This response was found to be client-controllable, with no server-side verification of the role being enforced.
By intercepting and modifying the response to include elevated privileges (e.g., ROLE_ADMIN), an attacker could gain unauthorized access to administrative functionalities without proper authorization.
How to Recreate the Vulnerability
- Intercept the authentication request and capture the response using a proxy tool (e.g., Burp Suite).
- Modify the authorities array in the authentication response to include elevated roles like ROLE_ADMIN.
- Forward the modified response back to the application.
- The UI and API responses now reflect the escalated privileges, confirming unauthorized role access.
Impact of the Vulnerability
The severity of this vulnerability is critical, as it can be exploited to:
- Unauthorized Access: Attackers can escalate privileges and access restricted administrative panels.
- Data Integrity Risks: Malicious users can manipulate sensitive data with admin-level rights.
- Improper Access Control: Server-side role enforcement is entirely bypassed, weakening the security posture.
Current Status
The vulnerability affects JHipster Platform versions up to 8.9.0. It has been responsibly disclosed and tracked as CVE-2025-43712.Immediate mitigation is strongly recommended to prevent exploitation.
What Can You Do?
- Update Immediately: Patch to the latest secure version of JHipster where proper server-side role verification is enforced.
- Implement Server-Side Role Enforcement: Never rely on client-side role declarations or authorization.
- Audit Authentication Logic: Ensure all privileges are derived solely on the server, regardless of what the client sends or modifies.
FireCompass PTaaS
This vulnerability was discovered through the FireCompass Continuous Automated Red Teaming (CART) & Penetration Testing as a Service (PTaaS) platform, which helps organizations proactively identify and remediate security gaps before attackers can exploit them.
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