Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:N/A:NSummary
CVE-2026-54016 is a medium-severity Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key (CWE-639) vulnerability in Openwebui Open Webui. Its CVSS base score is 4.3 (Medium).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190); ranked at the 18th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog; a public proof-of-concept is referenced.
This vulnerability is AI-related — categorised as LLM Application Platforms; in the Protocol-Specific Risks risk domain.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to AC-24 (Access Control Decisions) and AC-3 (Access Enforcement) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-38526
Vulnerability Data
Open WebUI is a self-hosted artificial intelligence platform designed to operate entirely offline. Prior to 0.9.6, Open WebUI has a Broken Object Level Authorization (BOLA) vulnerability in the builtin search_knowledge_files tool. When native function calling is enabled and the selected…
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model has no attached knowledge bases, an authenticated user can call search_knowledge_files with an arbitrary knowledge_id. The function then returns file metadata from that knowledge base without checking whether the user has read access. This allows unauthorized enumeration of private or restricted knowledge base files. This vulnerability is fixed in 0.9.6.
- CWE(s)
AI Security AnalysisAI
- AI Category
- LLM Application Platforms
- Risk Domain
- Protocol-Specific Risks
- OWASP Top 10 for LLMs 2025
- None mapped
- Classification Reason
- Matched keywords: artificial intelligence, function calling
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Enforcing approved authorizations on every access request structurally stops a user-controlled key from reaching another user's data.
Requiring explicit access-control decisions on each request blocks unauthorized key-driven access.
Least-privilege restrictions limit the scope of data reachable even if a key check is bypassed.
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.
Enforcing authorization policy and least privilege directly blocks user-controlled key tampering that bypasses access checks.
Logical access controls prevent unauthorized data access that results from missing authorization checks on object references.
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.
Security testing can detect missing authorization checks but does not prevent the weakness in production.
Information access restriction explicitly enforces that users may only retrieve data they are authorized to see, directly addressing user-controlled key bypass.
Access control policy directly requires enforcement of authorization rules that prevent unauthorized access via manipulated keys.
Managing access rights includes ensuring users can only access their own records and not bypass authorization by altering identifiers.
Privileged access rights control restricts what data each user may access, mitigating direct object reference attacks.
Secure development lifecycle includes authorization design but does not itself implement runtime access checks.