Identity impersonation via underscore header smuggling
Published Jul 28, 2026 · Updated Aug 25, 2026
Header smuggling in openshift/oauth-proxy in Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform allows remote authenticated users to impersonate upstream users. The proxy writes trusted identity headers only in dash form, such as X-Forwarded-User, and strips only those names, while Go stores X-Forwarded-User and X_Forwarded_User as different keys and WSGI and PHP normalize both into the same CGI variable. Exploitation requires authenticated access through oauth-proxy and an upstream application that consumes those forwarded identity headers for authorization; the exposure is upstream impersonation and possible privilege escalation, not a bypass of oauth-proxy's own login flow.
Summary
What happened
Header smuggling in openshift/oauth-proxy in Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform allows remote authenticated users to impersonate upstream users. The proxy writes trusted identity headers only in dash form, such as X-Forwarded-User, and strips only those names, while Go stores X-Forwarded-User and X_Forwarded_User as different keys and WSGI and PHP normalize both into the same CGI variable. Exploitation requires authenticated access through oauth-proxy and an upstream application that consumes those forwarded identity headers for authorization; the exposure is upstream impersonation and possible privilege escalation, not a bypass of oauth-proxy's own login flow.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-49332
- Published
- Jul 28, 2026
- Updated
- Aug 25, 2026
- Vendor
- Unknown vendor
- Product
- Unknown product
- Classifications
- CWE-436
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Jul 28, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Aug 25, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
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Attacks
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Technologies
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