Privilege escalation via colon-delimited username confusion
Published Feb 18, 2026 · Updated Feb 18, 2026
Authorization bypass in Orthanc 1.12.9 and earlier allows remote authenticated users to impersonate privileged accounts via Basic Auth. HttpServer authenticates the complete Base64-encoded username-password string, but GetAuthenticatedUsername splits the decoded value at the first colon, so a colon-bearing username is reported to authorization filters as a different user. Exploitation requires an administrator to register the crafted username and a Lua request filter that bases access rules on usernames; successful requests receive the impersonated account's privileges.
Summary
What happened
Authorization bypass in Orthanc 1.12.9 and earlier allows remote authenticated users to impersonate privileged accounts via Basic Auth. HttpServer authenticates the complete Base64-encoded username-password string, but GetAuthenticatedUsername splits the decoded value at the first colon, so a colon-bearing username is reported to authorization filters as a different user. Exploitation requires an administrator to register the crafted username and a Lua request filter that bases access rules on usernames; successful requests receive the impersonated account's privileges.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2025-15581
- Published
- Feb 18, 2026
- Updated
- Feb 18, 2026
- Vendor
- Orthanc
- Product
- Orthanc
- Classifications
- CWE-287, T1078
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Feb 18, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Feb 18, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
Compare these published version ranges with your installed build and any vendor patches.
- Affected versionversion=0 <=1.12.9
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
CVSS describes severity. EPSS estimates exploitation probability.
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Public exploit references
- Orthanc 1.12.9 user impersonation proof of conceptproof of concept · demonstrated
Labels summarize the accepted research assessment. They do not indicate a test against your environment.
Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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