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Fencer Intel
high 8.0

CVE-2020-15134 json

Missing TLS certificate verification in Faye

published 2020-07-31 6 y ago modified 2026-07-08 4 mo ago also GHSA-3q49-h8f9-9fr9 , EUVD-2020-0532

cvss
8.0
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.9%
EPSS 0.9% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 58%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

Faye before version 1.4.0, there is a lack of certification validation in TLS handshakes. Faye uses em-http-request and faye-websocket in the Ruby version of its client. Those libraries both use the `EM::Connection#start_tls` method in EventMachine to implement the TLS handshake whenever a `wss:` URL is used for the connection. This method does not implement certificate verification by default, meaning that it does not check that the server presents a valid and trusted TLS certificate for the expected hostname. That means that any `https:` or `wss:` connection made using these libraries is vulnerable to a man-in-the-middle attack, since it does not confirm the identity of the server it is connected to. The first request a Faye client makes is always sent via normal HTTP, but later messages may be sent via WebSocket. Therefore it is vulnerable to the same problem that these underlying libraries are, and we needed both libraries to support TLS verification before Faye could claim to do the same. Your client would still be insecure if its initial HTTPS request was verified, but later WebSocket connections were not. This is fixed in Faye v1.4.0, which enables verification by default. For further background information on this issue, please see the referenced GitHub Advisory.

Patch / fix

  • rubygems faye 1.4.0
  • faye_project faye 1.4.0
  • ruby-faye Debian 12 1.4.0-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2020-15134

Exploit prediction

0.86% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 58% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

Exploits and checks

  • github.com https://github.com/faye/faye/security/advisories/GHSA-3q49-h8f9-9fr9 referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified
  • blog.jcoglan.com https://blog.jcoglan.com/2020/07/31/missing-tls-verification-in-faye/ referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 3.1 8.0 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:N
NVD 3.1 8.7 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:N
NVD 2.0 6.4 AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:N
GitHub 3.1 8.0 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:N

Affected packages

ecosystem package affected fixed in
rubygems faye
<1.4.0
1.4.0

Affected products

  • faye faye

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-295 Improper Certificate Validation

References

Sources

Fencer Intel keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.