Cyber Resilience

CVE-2025-11990

Path Traversal in Gitlab 18.4.0 – 18.4.4

Path Traversal
Published
15 November 2025
Modified
19 November 2025
Patch / advisory
View advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 3.1
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:L/I:N/A:N
EPSS Score 0.0030 23th percentile
Risk Priority 28 floored blend · peak EPSS

Summary

CVE-2025-11990 is a low-severity Hex Encoding (CWE-177) vulnerability in Gitlab Gitlab. Its CVSS base score is 3.1 (Low).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190); ranked at the 23th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to AC-3 (Access Enforcement) and SI-10 (Information Input Validation) — see the control section below for these in your framework.

OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)

A01:2025 Broken Access Control

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

GitLab has remediated an issue in GitLab EE affecting all versions from 18.4 before 18.4.4, and 18.5 before 18.5.2 that could have allowed an authenticated user to gain CSRF tokens by exploiting improper input validation in repository references combined with…

more

redirect handling weaknesses.

CWE(s)
CWE-177CWE-22

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1190 Exploit Public-Facing Application Initial Access
Adversaries may attempt to exploit a weakness in an Internet-facing host or system to initially access a network.
attack.mitre.org →
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2024-0402Same product: Gitlab Gitlab
CVE-2024-8647Same product: Gitlab Gitlab
CVE-2023-2825Same product: Gitlab Gitlab
CVE-2024-2434Same product: Gitlab Gitlab
CVE-2018-14364Same product: Gitlab Gitlab
CVE-2023-3385Same product: Gitlab Gitlab
CVE-2025-21048Shared CWE-22
CVE-2026-23939Shared CWE-22
CVE-2024-7145Shared CWE-22
CVE-2023-42225Shared CWE-22

Affected Assets

gitlab
gitlab
18.4.0 — 18.4.4 · 18.5.0 — 18.5.2

Mitigating Controls

Control response

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53)

—

Detect
Catch it (NIST detect / respond)

—

Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)

—

Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)
  • V1.2.2
  • V5.3.2

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

AC-3 Access Enforcement good match

Enforces the intended directory access authorizations that path traversal would otherwise bypass.

SI-10 Information Input Validation good match

Proper input validation requires decoding and checking URL-encoded data before use, directly stopping the weakness from being exploitable.

AC-6 Least Privilege partial match

Least privilege reduces the impact of any unauthorized file access obtained via traversal.

Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

PR.PS-06 mostly match
prevents

Secure SDLC practices directly require correct URL-encoding/decoding and input validation during development.

PR.PS-02 partial match
prevents

Patching/maintenance can remediate known path-traversal flaws in deployed software (partial prevention of exploitability) but does nothing to stop the coding defect from being introduced in the first place.

PR.AA-05 none match
prevents

PR.AA-05 defines and reviews access policies but does not address code-level pathname neutralization, so neither direction prevents CWE-22.

Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

A.8.29 Security testing in development and acceptance mostly match
finds

Security testing in development catches URL-decoding flaws before release, but does not itself define coding rules.

A.8.25 Secure development life cycle partial match
prevents

Secure SDLC processes include validation steps that reduce CWE-177, yet the control is broader than this single weakness.

A.8.26 Application security requirements partial match
prevents

Application security requirements explicitly call for input validation and canonicalization, directly preventing improper URL decoding.

A.8.27 Secure system architecture and engineering principles partial match
prevents

Secure architecture principles require least-privilege file access and directory isolation.

A.8.28 Secure coding partial match
prevents

Secure coding standards mandate proper handling and decoding of encoded inputs, eliminating CWE-177.

A.8.3 Information access restriction partial match
mitigates

Information access restriction limits which files an application may read or write.

References