What is CVE-2023-48218?

CVE-2023-48218 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Strapi Protected Populate, classified under Incorrect Authorization. CVSS score: 5.3/10. Published 2023-11-20.

How severe is CVE-2023-48218?

Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 5.3 out of 10.

Auth bypass in Strapi Protected Populate

CVE-2023-48218

The Strapi Protected Populate Plugin protects `get` endpoints from revealing too much information. Prior to version 1.3.4, users were able to bypass the field level security. Users who tried to populate something that they didn't have access to could populate those fields anyway. This issue has been patched in version 1.3.4. There are no known workarounds.

Vulnerability class: Broken Access Control

Published 2023-11-20 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 5.3 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:N/A:N.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.006 (46.7th percentile), scored 2026-09-30.

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 47th percentile — 46.7% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.006 · newest: 0.006 · change: 0.000

Affected products

Strapi Protected Populate
Strapi-Community Strapi-Plugin-Protected-Populate — versions < 1.3.4

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-863 — Incorrect Authorization

References

github.com/strapi-community/strapi-plugin-protected-populate/security/advisorie… (Vendor Advisory)
github.com/strapi-community/strapi-plugin-protected-populate/commit/05441066d64… (Patch)
github.com/strapi-community/strapi-plugin-protected-populate/releases/tag/v1.3.4 (Release Notes)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2023-48218?: CVE-2023-48218 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Strapi Protected Populate, classified under Incorrect Authorization. CVSS score: 5.3/10. Published 2023-11-20.
How severe is CVE-2023-48218?: Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 5.3 out of 10.