CVE-2026-20896

A critical vulnerability in Gitea, tracked as CVE-2026-59774, allows unauthenticated attackers to read arbitrary files accessible by the Gitea service account by exploiting the Org-mode markup renderer. The flaw exists in versions 1.22.1 through 1.27.0 and is triggered via a crafted Org-mode #+INCLUDE directive processed by the /{owner}/{repo}/markup endpoint. Although not direct remote code execution, attackers can chain the file-read capability with reading app.ini to extract the INTERNAL_TOKEN and subsequently inject Git hooks to achieve command execution. The vulnerability was discovered by XBOW Security and independently reported by Shai Rod, with no known in-the-wild exploitation observed at the time of disclosure.

Hackers are actively exploiting a critical authentication bypass vulnerability, CVE-2026-20896, in the official Gitea Docker image. The flaw allows unauthenticated attackers to impersonate any user, including administrators, by spoofing the X-WEBAUTH-USER header when reverse proxy settings are misconfigured. The vulnerability affects Gitea Docker images up to version 1.26.2 in default configurations, and exploitation has already been observed in the wild. Singapore’s Cybersecurity Agency (CSA) has issued a warning, urging users to upgrade to patched versions 1.26.3 or 1.26.4.