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Vulnerability details: VCID-wdcn-hjun-vuaq
Vulnerability ID VCID-wdcn-hjun-vuaq
Aliases CVE-2023-22489
GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725
GMS-2023-11
Summary Any Flarum user including unactivated can reply in public discussions whose first post was permanently deleted If the first post of a discussion is permanently deleted but the discussion stays visible, any actor who can view the discussion is able to create a new reply via the REST API, no matter the reply permission or lock status. This includes users that don't have a validated email. Guests cannot successfully create a reply because the API will fail with a 500 error when the user ID 0 is inserted into the database. This should also be fixed to return the expected 401/403 status. This happens because when the first post of a discussion is permanently deleted, the `first_post_id` attribute of the discussion becomes `null` which causes access control to be skipped for all new replies. Flarum automatically makes discussions with zero comments invisible so an additional condition for this vulnerability is that the discussion must have at least one approved reply so that `discussions.comment_count` is still above zero after the post deletion. ### Impact This can open the discussion to uncontrolled spam or just unintentional replies if users still had their tab open before the vulnerable discussion was locked and then post a reply when they shouldn't be able to. In combination with the email notification settings, this could also be used as a way to send unsolicited emails. Versions between `v1.3.0` and `v1.6.3` are impacted. ### Patches The vulnerability has been fixed and published as flarum/core v1.6.3. All communities running Flarum should upgrade as soon as possible to v1.6.3 using: ``` composer update --prefer-dist --no-dev -a -W ``` You can then confirm you run the latest version using: ``` composer show flarum/core ``` ### Workarounds If you don't delete the first posts you are not affected. A workaround can be to delete the discussion itself, or amend the database to manually set a `first_post_id`. ### For more information For any questions or comments on this vulnerability please visit https://discuss.flarum.org/ For support questions create a discussion at https://discuss.flarum.org/t/support. A reminder that if you ever become aware of a security issue in Flarum, please report it to us privately by emailing [security@flarum.org](mailto:security@flarum.org), and we will address it promptly.
Status Published
Exploitability 0.5
Weighted Severity 3.1
Risk 1.6
Affected and Fixed Packages Package Details
Weaknesses (3)
CWE-862 Missing Authorization
CWE-1035 OWASP Top Ten 2017 Category A9 - Using Components with Known Vulnerabilities
CWE-937 OWASP Top Ten 2013 Category A9 - Using Components with Known Vulnerabilities
System Score Found at
epss 0.00299 https://api.first.org/data/v1/epss?cve=CVE-2023-22489
epss 0.00299 https://api.first.org/data/v1/epss?cve=CVE-2023-22489
cvssv3.1 3.5 https://github.com/flarum/framework
generic_textual LOW https://github.com/flarum/framework
cvssv3.1 3.5 https://github.com/flarum/framework/commit/12f14112a0ecd1484d97330b82beb2a145919015
generic_textual LOW https://github.com/flarum/framework/commit/12f14112a0ecd1484d97330b82beb2a145919015
ssvc Track https://github.com/flarum/framework/commit/12f14112a0ecd1484d97330b82beb2a145919015
cvssv3.1 3.5 https://github.com/flarum/framework/releases/tag/v1.6.3
generic_textual LOW https://github.com/flarum/framework/releases/tag/v1.6.3
ssvc Track https://github.com/flarum/framework/releases/tag/v1.6.3
cvssv3.1 3.5 https://github.com/flarum/framework/security/advisories/GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725
generic_textual LOW https://github.com/flarum/framework/security/advisories/GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725
ssvc Track https://github.com/flarum/framework/security/advisories/GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725
cvssv3.1 3.5 https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-22489
generic_textual LOW https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-22489
Reference id Reference type URL
https://api.first.org/data/v1/epss?cve=CVE-2023-22489
https://github.com/flarum/framework
https://github.com/flarum/framework/commit/12f14112a0ecd1484d97330b82beb2a145919015
https://github.com/flarum/framework/releases/tag/v1.6.3
https://github.com/flarum/framework/security/advisories/GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-22489
GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725 https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725
No exploits are available.
Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N Found at https://github.com/flarum/framework
Attack Vector (AV) Attack Complexity (AC) Privileges Required (PR) User Interaction (UI) Scope (S) Confidentiality Impact (C) Integrity Impact (I) Availability Impact (A)

network

adjacent_network

local

physical

low

high

none

low

high

none

required

unchanged

changed

high

low

none

high

low

none

high

low

none
Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N Found at https://github.com/flarum/framework/commit/12f14112a0ecd1484d97330b82beb2a145919015
Attack Vector (AV) Attack Complexity (AC) Privileges Required (PR) User Interaction (UI) Scope (S) Confidentiality Impact (C) Integrity Impact (I) Availability Impact (A)

network

adjacent_network

local

physical

low

high

none

low

high

none

required

unchanged

changed

high

low

none

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low

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none
Vector: SSVCv2/E:N/A:N/T:P/P:M/B:A/M:M/D:T/2025-03-10T21:00:08Z/ Found at https://github.com/flarum/framework/commit/12f14112a0ecd1484d97330b82beb2a145919015
Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N Found at https://github.com/flarum/framework/releases/tag/v1.6.3
Attack Vector (AV) Attack Complexity (AC) Privileges Required (PR) User Interaction (UI) Scope (S) Confidentiality Impact (C) Integrity Impact (I) Availability Impact (A)

network

adjacent_network

local

physical

low

high

none

low

high

none

required

unchanged

changed

high

low

none

high

low

none

high

low

none
Vector: SSVCv2/E:N/A:N/T:P/P:M/B:A/M:M/D:T/2025-03-10T21:00:08Z/ Found at https://github.com/flarum/framework/releases/tag/v1.6.3
Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N Found at https://github.com/flarum/framework/security/advisories/GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725
Attack Vector (AV) Attack Complexity (AC) Privileges Required (PR) User Interaction (UI) Scope (S) Confidentiality Impact (C) Integrity Impact (I) Availability Impact (A)

network

adjacent_network

local

physical

low

high

none

low

high

none

required

unchanged

changed

high

low

none

high

low

none

high

low

none
Vector: SSVCv2/E:N/A:N/T:P/P:M/B:A/M:M/D:T/2025-03-10T21:00:08Z/ Found at https://github.com/flarum/framework/security/advisories/GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725
Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N Found at https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-22489
Attack Vector (AV) Attack Complexity (AC) Privileges Required (PR) User Interaction (UI) Scope (S) Confidentiality Impact (C) Integrity Impact (I) Availability Impact (A)

network

adjacent_network

local

physical

low

high

none

low

high

none

required

unchanged

changed

high

low

none

high

low

none

high

low

none
Exploit Prediction Scoring System (EPSS)
Percentile 0.53539
EPSS Score 0.00299
Published At June 4, 2026, 12:55 p.m.
Date Actor Action Source VulnerableCode Version
2026-06-04T17:16:52.695483+00:00 GithubOSV Importer Import https://github.com/github/advisory-database/blob/main/advisories/github-reviewed/2023/01/GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725/GHSA-hph3-hv3c-7725.json 38.6.0