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CRITICALpublic exploit

CVE-2026-52824

CVE-2026-52824 — Kimai: Default APP_SECRET in Docker Image Enables Cookie Forgery and Account Takeover

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.

Published Updated Sources: cvelistV5, GitHub_M

Triage

Is it exploited, how likely is exploitation, what does it touch, and how severe do the scoring sources call it.

Exploitation

Exploit code

public exploit, none observed

EPSS

1%

chance of exploitation in 30 days

Affects

kimai

kimai

CVSS base

9.1

CRITICAL

CISA SSVC assessment

Three decision points CISA publishes for the CVEs it assesses · SSVC 2.0.3. A stakeholder decision, not a severity score.

CISA

Exploitation

None

none · proof-of-concept · active

Automatable

No

can an attacker script all four kill-chain steps

Technical impact

Total

partial · total control of the vulnerable component

Affected scope

The catalog records vendors and products as separate lists, not pairs, so which product belongs to which vendor is not something this page can say.

Vendors (1)

kimai

Products (1)

kimai

Every base score collected

Sources score independently and disagree; each row says who scored it and under which version.

ScoreVersionSeverityExpl.ImpactSource
9.1CVSS 4.0CRITICAL——cvelistV5

Weakness & attack patterns

  • CWE-1188

Attack patterns reported against this CVE. The ATT&CK techniques below are inferred from its weakness class.

  • T1211Exploitation for Defensive Evasion
  • T1542.002Pre-OS Boot: Component Firmware
  • T1556Modify Authentication Process

Public exploit

Capability, not use: code existing is a different claim from anyone running it.

Indexed by

poc in github

Detection

Read off the CVSS vector and the weakness class. Starting points, not rules we have tested.

  • Search application, proxy, and WAF logs for requests touching /entrypoint.sh.

References

5 on the record

Elsewhere on this site

  • kimaievery CVE for this vendor
  • CWE-1188other pages naming this weakness

Not in any source we poll

Listed rather than left blank: an empty field and an unmeasured one look identical on screen, and only one is a reason to look elsewhere.

  • No confirmed IOCs, IP addresses, domains, file hashes, or malware artifacts supplied.
  • No organization-specific asset inventory, compensating-control status, or patch deployment evidence supplied.
  • No exploit packet captures, log samples, or incident case IDs supplied.