Vulnerabilities / CVE-2026-52824

critical

CVE-2026-52824

Kimai: Default APP_SECRET in Docker Image Enables Cookie Forgery and Account Takeover

Published Modified CWE 1188
In the Trivy database since at least 24 Oct 2026, 07:11 UTCWhen it arrived before that build is not recorded.

Severity by source

GHSA9.1CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:H/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N

Trivy's own label is CRITICAL. Rated critical by GHSA.

Description

Kimai is an open-source time tracking application. Prior to 2.58.0, the official Docker image sets APP_SECRET to the public value change_this_to_something_unique in Dockerfile, and .docker/entrypoint.sh neither replaces nor rejects that value before Symfony uses it as kernel.secret. An unauthenticated attacker who reaches a deployment that did not override APP_SECRET, knows a username, correctly guesses the account ID associated with that username, and targets an account without active two-factor authentication can forge HMAC-protected authentication artifacts, including KIMAI_REMEMBER cookies and login links, to access the account without its password. The updated entrypoint generates and persists a random secret when no safe operator-provided value exists. This issue is fixed in version 2.58.0.

Affected packages and fixed versions

SourcePackageFixed in
composer::GitHub Security Advisory Composerkimai/kimai2.58.0

References

Vulnerability data compiled from the Trivy vulnerability database (trivy-db, Aqua Security, Apache License 2.0), which aggregates third-party advisories. CVE records are published by The MITRE Corporation under the CVE Terms of Use; CVE is a trademark of MITRE. This product uses data from the NVD API but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD. Severity, titles and advisory data from the GitHub Advisory Database (CC BY 4.0), Red Hat security data (CC BY 4.0) and the other sources linked on each entry. Entries may be summarised or re-formatted; the linked original is the authoritative record.