{"schema_version":"1.7.3","id":"GHSA-524m-q5m7-79mm","published":"2026-01-13T15:11:42Z","modified":"2026-02-03T03:01:29.999168Z","aliases":["CVE-2026-22689","GO-2026-4310"],"summary":"Mailpit is vulnerable to Cross-Site WebSocket Hijacking (CSWSH) allowing unauthenticated access to emails","details":"**Summary**\nThe Mailpit WebSocket server is configured to accept connections from any origin. This lack of Origin header validation introduces a Cross-Site WebSocket Hijacking (CSWSH) vulnerability.\n\nAn attacker can host a malicious website that, when visited by a developer running Mailpit locally, establishes a WebSocket connection to the victim's Mailpit instance (default ws://localhost:8025). This allows the attacker to intercept sensitive data such as email contents, headers, and server statistics in real-time.\n\n**Vulnerable Code**\nThe vulnerability exists in server/websockets/client.go where the CheckOrigin function is explicitly set to return true for all requests, bypassing standard Same-Origin Policy (SOP) protections provided by the gorilla/websocket library.\n\nhttps://github.com/axllent/mailpit/blob/877a9159ceeaf380d5bb0e1d84017b24d2e7b361/server/websockets/client.go#L34-L39\n\n**Impact**\nThis vulnerability impacts the Confidentiality of the data stored in or processed by Mailpit.\nAlthough Mailpit is often used as a local development tool, this vulnerability allows remote exploitation via a web browser.\n\n- **Scenario**: A developer has Mailpit running at localhost:8025.\n- **Trigger**: The developer visits a malicious website (or a compromised legitimate site) in the same browser.\n- **Exploitation**: The malicious site's JavaScript initiates a WebSocket connection to ws://localhost:8025/api/events. Since the origin check is disabled, the browser allows this cross-origin connection.\n- **Data Leak**: The attacker receives all broadcasted events, including full email details (subjects, sender/receiver info) and server metrics.\n\n**Attack Impact**\n- Real-time notification of new emails\n- Email metadata (sender, subject, recipients)\n- Mailbox statistics\n- All WebSocket broadcast data\n\n**Recommended Fix**\nThe `CheckOrigin` function should be removed to allow gorilla/websocket to enforce its default safe behavior (checking that the Origin matches the Host). Alternatively, strict validation logic should be implemented.\n\n**Proposed Change (Remove unsafe check):**\n\n```go\nvar upgrader = websocket.Upgrader{\n    ReadBufferSize:    1024,\n    WriteBufferSize:   1024,\n    // CheckOrigin: func(r *http.Request) bool { return true }, // REMOVED\n    EnableCompression: true,\n}\n```\n\n**Proof of Concept (PoC)**: To reproduce this vulnerability:\n\n- Start Mailpit (default settings).\n- Save the following HTML code as poc.html and serve it from a different origin (e.g., using python http.server on port 8000 or opening it directly as a file).\n- Open the [poc_websocket_hijack.html](https://github.com/user-attachments/files/24522726/poc_websocket_hijack.html) file in your browser.\n- Send a test email to Mailpit or perform any action in the Mailpit UI.\n- Observe that the \"malicious\" page successfully receives the event data.","affected":[{"package":{"name":"github.com/axllent/mailpit","ecosystem":"Go","purl":"pkg:golang/github.com/axllent/mailpit"},"ranges":[{"type":"SEMVER","events":[{"introduced":"1.2.6"},{"fixed":"1.28.2"}]}],"database_specific":{"source":"https://github.com/github/advisory-database/blob/main/advisories/github-reviewed/2026/01/GHSA-524m-q5m7-79mm/GHSA-524m-q5m7-79mm.json"}},{"package":{"name":"github.com/axllent/mailpit","ecosystem":"Go","purl":"pkg:golang/github.com/axllent/mailpit"},"ranges":[{"type":"SEMVER","events":[{"introduced":"0"},{"fixed":"0.0.0-20260110031614"}]}],"database_specific":{"source":"https://github.com/github/advisory-database/blob/main/advisories/github-reviewed/2026/01/GHSA-524m-q5m7-79mm/GHSA-524m-q5m7-79mm.json"}}],"references":[{"type":"WEB","url":"https://github.com/axllent/mailpit/security/advisories/GHSA-524m-q5m7-79mm"},{"type":"ADVISORY","url":"https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-22689"},{"type":"WEB","url":"https://github.com/axllent/mailpit/commit/6f1f4f34c98989fd873261018fb73830b30aec3f"},{"type":"PACKAGE","url":"https://github.com/axllent/mailpit"}],"database_specific":{"cwe_ids":["CWE-1385"],"github_reviewed":true,"github_reviewed_at":"2026-01-13T15:11:42Z","nvd_published_at":"2026-01-10T06:15:51Z","severity":"MODERATE"},"severity":[{"type":"CVSS_V3","score":"CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N"}]}