CVE-2025-68438
Published: 16 January 2026
Summary
CVE-2025-68438 is a high-severity Exposure of Sensitive Information to an Unauthorized Actor (CWE-200) vulnerability in Apache Airflow. Its CVSS base score is 7.5 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190); ranked at the 7.6th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified are NIST 800-53 AC-14 (Permitted Actions Without Identification or Authentication) and SI-15 (Information Output Filtering).
Deeper analysis
CVE-2025-68438 is a vulnerability in Apache Airflow versions before 3.1.6 that exposes sensitive information. Specifically, when rendered template fields in a DAG exceed the configured [core] max_templated_field_length, sensitive values can appear in cleartext in the Rendered Templates UI. This issue stems from the serialization of those fields using a secrets masker instance that does not incorporate user-registered mask_secret() patterns, preventing reliable masking of secrets prior to truncation and display. The vulnerability is classified under CWE-200 (Exposure of Sensitive Information to an Unauthorized Actor) with a CVSS v3.1 base score of 7.5 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N).
Any unauthenticated attacker with network access to the Airflow web interface can exploit this vulnerability without requiring privileges or user interaction. By viewing the Rendered Templates UI for a DAG containing templated fields longer than the max_templated_field_length threshold and embedding secrets, the attacker can obtain those secrets in plaintext after truncation, achieving high-impact confidentiality violations such as leakage of credentials or other sensitive data.
Apache Airflow advisories recommend upgrading to version 3.1.6 or later, which resolves the issue by ensuring the secrets masker includes user-registered patterns during serialization. Additional details are provided in the official Apache announcement at https://lists.apache.org/thread/55n7b4nlsz3vo5n4h5lrj9bfsk8ctyff and the OSS-Security mailing list post at http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2026/01/15/5.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-2913
Vulnerability details
In Apache Airflow versions before 3.1.6, when rendered template fields in a Dag exceed [core] max_templated_field_length, sensitive values could be exposed in cleartext in the Rendered Templates UI. This occurred because serialization of those fields used a secrets masker instance…
more
that did not include user-registered mask_secret() patterns, so secrets were not reliably masked before truncation and display. Users are recommended to upgrade to 3.1.6 or later, which fixes this issue
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
Vulnerability in public-facing Airflow web UI directly enables exploitation for sensitive data/credential exposure (T1190); resulting plaintext secret leakage maps to unsecured credentials access (T1552).
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Directly remediates the flaw in secrets masking during rendered template serialization and truncation in Apache Airflow.
Filters sensitive values from output in the Rendered Templates UI to prevent cleartext exposure after truncation.
Limits permitted actions without identification or authentication, blocking unauthenticated access to the vulnerable Rendered Templates UI.