Cyber Resilience

CVE-2025-68941

Access Control in Gitea ≤ 1.22.3

Access Control
Published
26 December 2025
Modified
02 January 2026
Patch / advisory
View advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 4.9
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N
EPSS Score 0.0024 16th percentile
Risk Priority 35 floored blend · peak EPSS

Summary

CVE-2025-68941 is a medium-severity Incorrect Authorization (CWE-863) vulnerability in Gitea Gitea. Its CVSS base score is 4.9 (Medium).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); ranked at the 16th 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 AC-6 (Least Privilege) — 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

Gitea before 1.22.3 mishandles access to a private resource upon receiving an API token with scope limited to public resources.

CWE(s)
CWE-863

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI

T1068 Exploitation for Privilege Escalation Privilege Escalation
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in an attempt to elevate privileges.
attack.mitre.org →
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 →
Why these techniques?

Authorization bypass (CWE-863) in public-facing Gitea API directly enables exploitation of the application and privilege escalation to private resources.

Confidence: HIGH · MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise v19.0

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2025-68940Same product: Gitea Gitea
CVE-2026-20750Same product: Gitea Gitea
CVE-2025-68938Same product: Gitea Gitea
CVE-2025-68944Same product: Gitea Gitea
CVE-2025-68939Same product: Gitea Gitea
CVE-2026-20897Same product: Gitea Gitea
CVE-2026-20912Same product: Gitea Gitea
CVE-2025-69413Same product: Gitea Gitea
CVE-2026-20888Same product: Gitea Gitea
CVE-2026-20736Same product: Gitea Gitea

Affected Assets

gitea
gitea
≤ 1.22.3

Mitigating Controls

Control response

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53)
  • AC-3 Access Enforcement
  • AC-6 Least Privilege
  • AC-4 Information Flow Enforcement
Detect
Catch it (NIST detect / respond)

—

Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)
  • 5 hardening rules · 3 OS baselines
Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)

—

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

AC-3 Access Enforcement good match
prevent

Directly enforces that an API token whose scope is restricted to public resources cannot be used to access private resources.

AC-6 Least Privilege good match
prevent

Ensures the token is granted only the minimal privileges declared in its scope, preventing escalation to private resources.

AC-4 Information Flow Enforcement partial match
prevent

Enforces information-flow rules that restrict data access according to the token's declared public-only scope.

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.AA-05 mostly match
prevents

Defining, enforcing, and reviewing access authorizations and least privilege directly prevents incorrect authorization checks.

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.5.15 Access control partial match
prevents

Requiring consistency between access rights and classification plus formal approval steps ensures that the authorization logic correctly distinguishes between entities that should and should not be granted access.

A.5.18 Access rights partial match
prevents

Enforcing policy-driven approval and role-change reviews stops incorrect or stale authorization decisions from remaining in effect after job changes or terminations.

A.8.3 Information access restriction partial match
prevents

By tying access rights to identity, device, location and classification, the control reduces the likelihood that an authorization decision will be based on an incorrect or bypassed policy.

References