Vulnerability Report

CVE-2026-42429

Title: Privilege Escalation in OpenClaw gateway plugin HTTP authentication

Auth Bypass

Proof Of Concept

No public PoC currently indexed for CVE-2026-42429.

CWE Category CWE-863
Published Date Apr 28, 2026
Modified Date May 26, 2026
Exploit Status Not Found
Score 6.0 CVSS v4.0
Exploit Probability (EPSS)
0.24%

Vulnerability Summary

CVE-2026-42429: OpenClaw before 2026.4.8 contains a privilege escalation vulnerability in the gateway plugin HTTP authentication mechanism that escalates identity-bearing operator.read requests to runtime operator.write permissions. Attackers can exploit this by sending read-scoped requests through the gateway auth route to gain unauthorized write access to runtime operations.

Impacted Vendors

O
openclaw 1

Reference Links

https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw/commit/d7c3210cd6f5fdfdc1beff4c9541673e814354d5 https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw/security/advisories/GHSA-4f8g-77mw-3rxc https://www.vulncheck.com/advisories/openclaw-privilege-escalation-via-gateway-plugin-http-authentication
CVSS v4.0
Source Entity [email protected]
Severity MEDIUM
6.0
Attack Vector
NETWORK
Complexity
LOW
Privileges
N/A
Interaction
NONE
Confidentiality
N/A
Integrity
N/A
Availability
N/A
Scope
N/A
RAW VECTOR CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:L/UI:N/VC:L/VI:H/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/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
CVSS v3.1
Source Entity [email protected]
Severity HIGH
7.1
Attack Vector
NETWORK
Complexity
LOW
Privileges
N/A
Interaction
NONE
Confidentiality
N/A
Integrity
N/A
Availability
N/A
Scope
UNCHANGED
RAW VECTOR CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:H/A:N

Associated Attack Patterns (CAPEC)

Total: Patterns

CVE-2026-42429 Exploits & PoCs (Proof Of Concept)

No public PoCs found in our database for this CVE.

MODIFIED

Vulnerability data updated via NVD.

MODIFIED

Vulnerability data updated via NVD.

MODIFIED

Vulnerability data updated via NVD.

Attack Vector Matrix

Access Vector NETWORK
Complexity LOW
Privileges N/A
Interaction NONE
CVSS Vector String CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:L/UI:N/VC:L/VI:H/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/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 Stack

No specific products linked.