Cyber Resilience

CVE-2026-27151

Access Control in Discourse ≤ 2025.12.2

Published
26 February 2026
Modified
02 March 2026
Patch / advisory
CVSS Score v4 1.3
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:N/VI:L/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:U/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X
EPSS Score 0.0015 5th percentile
Risk Priority 15 floored blend · peak EPSS

Summary

CVE-2026-27151 is a low-severity Missing Authorization (CWE-862) vulnerability in Discourse Discourse. Its CVSS base score is 1.3 (Low).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190); ranked at the 5th 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-4 (Information Flow Enforcement) — see the control section below for these in your framework.

OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

Discourse is an open source discussion platform. Prior to versions 2025.12.2, 2026.1.1, and 2026.2.0, the `move_posts` action only checked `can_move_posts?` on the source topic but never validated write permissions on the destination topic. This allowed TL4 users and category group…

more

moderators to move posts into topics in categories where they lack posting privileges (e.g., read-only categories or categories with group-restricted write access). Versions 2025.12.2, 2026.1.1, and 2026.2.0 patch the issue. No known workarounds are available.

CWE(s)

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI

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.
Why these techniques?

Authorization bypass in public-facing Discourse platform directly enables exploitation of the web application to perform unauthorized actions.

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

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2024-36113Same product: Discourse Discourse
CVE-2025-24972Same product: Discourse Discourse
CVE-2025-31681Shared CWE-862
CVE-2023-46309Shared CWE-862
CVE-2025-27296Shared CWE-862
CVE-2025-31691Shared CWE-862
CVE-2025-64356Shared CWE-862
CVE-2025-22318Shared CWE-862
CVE-2025-26956Shared CWE-862
CVE-2025-48916Shared CWE-862

Affected Assets

discourse
discourse
2026.2.0 · ≤ 2025.12.2 · 2026.1.0 — 2026.1.1

Mitigating Controls

Control response

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

prevent

Directly enforces authorization checks on every access request, which would have required validating write permission on the destination topic before allowing move_posts.

prevent

Enforces information flow rules between topics/categories, preventing unauthorized post movement into read-only or restricted-write destinations.

prevent

Restricts users (TL4/category moderators) to only the privileges needed for their role, limiting the impact of the missing destination-topic check.

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 full match
prevents

Explicitly requires defining, enforcing, and reviewing authorizations and least privilege, directly preventing missing 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.

prevents

Requiring authentication and credentials before any access occurs eliminates the absence of authorization checks that would otherwise allow an unauthenticated actor to reach protected resources.

prevents

Requiring formal authorization of every access request before rights are granted ensures that checks for required permissions are performed, preventing missing authorization checks from being introduced.

prevents

Mandatory authorization checks and central records of granted rights ensure that every access attempt is preceded by an explicit decision rather than relying on missing checks.

mitigates

Segregating the approval of access rights from their implementation provides an independent check that reduces the impact of missing authorization checks in the resulting system configuration.

detects

By requiring competent outsiders to verify that every function enforces the need-to-know principle, the control lowers the likelihood that missing authorization checks persist undetected.

prevents

Defining authorization responsibilities and reviewing risk-treatment progress throughout the project lifecycle catches missing authorization checks before the system is deployed.

References