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GHSA-x6fw-778m-wr9v

CriticalCVSS 9.3 / 10

Published Mar 9, 2026·Last modified Mar 16, 2026

Affected Components(0)

No affected components available

Description

Impact

The Google, Apple, and Facebook authentication adapters use JWT verification to validate identity tokens. When the adapter's audience configuration option is not set (clientId for Google/Apple, appIds for Facebook), JWT verification silently skips audience claim validation. This allows an attacker to use a validly signed JWT issued for a different application to authenticate as any user on the target Parse Server.

For Google and Apple, the vulnerability is exploitable when the server does not configure clientId. The adapters accepted this as valid and simply skipped audience validation.
For Facebook Limited Login, the vulnerability exists regardless of configuration. The adapter validated appIds only for Standard Login (Graph API), but the Limited Login JWT path never passed appIds as the audience to JWT verification.

Patches

The fix enforces clientId (Google/Apple) and appIds (Facebook) as mandatory and passes them to JWT verification for audience validation. While this is technically a breaking change for servers that omit these options, it is not a breaking change as per documentation — all three options are documented as required configuration.

Workarounds

Google / Apple: Ensure clientId is set in the adapter configuration. When set, JWT verification correctly validates the audience claim even on unpatched versions.
Facebook Limited Login: There is no workaround. The unpatched adapter does not pass appIds to JWT audience validation, so the only mitigation is to upgrade.

References

GitHub security advisory: https://github.com/parse-community/parse-server/security/advisories/GHSA-x6fw-778m-wr9v
Fix Parse Server 9: https://github.com/parse-community/parse-server/releases/tag/9.5.0-alpha.11
Fix Parse Server 8: https://github.com/parse-community/parse-server/releases/tag/8.6.10

Risk Scores

Base Score

9.3

The vulnerability can be exploited over the network without needing physical access. It is easy for an attacker to exploit this vulnerability. An attacker does not need any special privileges or access rights. No user interaction is needed for the attacker to exploit this vulnerability.

Threat Intelligence

8.0

Exploitation activity has been observed. Apply available patches or mitigations urgently.

EPSS

0.53%

The exploit probability is very low. The vulnerability is unlikely to be exploited in the next 30 days.

Exploit

Not available

We did not find any exploit available. Neither in GitHub repositories nor in the Exploit-Database.

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Critical severity

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