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Fencer Intel
medium 6.4

CVE-2026-54743 json

Lemmy: Stored XSS via markdown image alt-text in lemmy-ui html5-embed

published 5mo ago modified 2mo ago also EUVD-2026-62848 , GHSA-2g66-9fr3-ppwj

Unreviewed: the maintainers' own advisory

Published by the maintainers on their GitHub repository LemmyNet/lemmy. GitHub has not reviewed it into the GitHub Advisory Database, so the affected packages and versions are the maintainers' word. Read the full advisory on GitHub.

cvss
6.4
version 4.0, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.5%
EPSS 0.5% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 46%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

Lemmy is a link aggregator and forum for the fediverse. Prior to lemmy-ui 0.19.19-beta.1, LemmyNet/lemmy-ui renders Markdown in src/shared/markdown.ts for post bodies, comment bodies, private messages, and community and site sidebars through mdToHtml, which returns a raw __html object that Inferno injects without a sanitizer pass. setupMarkdown configures html as false but registers markdown-it-html5-embed@1.0.0 with useImageSyntax enabled, so an image targeting video media becomes a video element whose fallback incorporates the image alt text through unescaped string replacement. The html setting does not apply to plugin-generated output, allowing crafted alt text to reach the DOM as live HTML in contexts that do not use mdToHtmlNoImages. An approved member or a remote federated instance can store such content, and a viewer who renders it may execute JavaScript in the lemmy-ui origin, exposing the viewer's session and authenticated actions. The advisory notes that Content Security Policy prevents the described exploit in production, but also states that the tested default self-hosted deployment serves no Content-Security-Policy. This issue is fixed in lemmy-ui version 0.19.19-beta.1.

Patch / fix

  • join-lemmy lemmy 0.19.19-beta.1

Is CVE-2026-54743 in your stack? Fencer shows which of your repositories are affected as soon as an advisory lands, and opens the fix as a pull request.

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CISA SSVC

Exploitation
Proof of concept is public
Automatable
no
Technical impact
partial
Assessed
2mo ago

Exploit prediction

0.55% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 46% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-11).

Exploits and checks

  • github.com https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/security/advisories/GHSA-2g66-9fr3-ppwj referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 4.0 6.4 CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:P/VC:N/VI:N/VA:N/SC:H/SI:H/SA:N
CNA 4.0 6.4 CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:P/VC:N/VI:N/VA:N/SC:H/SI:H/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X

Affected products

  • LemmyNet lemmy

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-79 Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation

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.

The maintainers of LemmyNet/lemmy published their own advisory on GitHub. Reviewed sources take precedence over it.

CPEs and fixed versions use Anchore's correction of NVD's data: Added CPE configurations because not yet analyzed by NVD.