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Kimai: Timesheet PATCH/POST allows assigning to project outside user's team via query_builder OR-bypass

Moderate severity GitHub Reviewed Published Jun 11, 2026 in kimai/kimai • Updated Jul 13, 2026

Package

composer kimai/kimai (Composer)

Affected versions

<= 2.56.0

Patched versions

2.57.0

Description

Summary

The Timesheet API PATCH /api/timesheets/{id} and POST /api/timesheets endpoints accept a user-supplied project ID and resolve it through a Symfony EntityType whose query_builder allows the submitted ID to satisfy the access predicate via an unconditional OR branch. As a result, any authenticated user can re-assign their own timesheet to any project in the database — including projects that belong to teams or customers they have no membership in and cannot otherwise see. The user can then read serialized project/customer details via GET /api/timesheets/{id}?full=true, leaking metadata (name, currency, customer hierarchy) that would otherwise be filtered out by the team ACL.

Details

Entry point — only ownership is checked in src/API/TimesheetController.php:317-355

#[IsGranted('edit', 'timesheet')]
#[Route(methods: ['PATCH'], path: '/{id}', name: 'patch_timesheet', requirements: ['id' => '\d+'])]
public function patchAction(Request $request, Timesheet $timesheet): Response
{
    ...
    $form = $this->createForm(TimesheetApiEditForm::class, $timesheet, [...]);
    $form->setData($timesheet);
    $form->submit($request->request->all(), false);
    if (false === $form->isValid()) { ... }
    $this->service->saveTimesheet($timesheet);
    ...
}

src/Voter/TimesheetVoter.php:134-142:

if ($subject->getUser()?->getId() === $user->getId()) {
    return $this->permissionManager->hasRolePermission($user, $permission . '_own_timesheet');
}

if (!$this->permissionManager->checkTeamAccessTimesheet($subject, $user)) {
    return false;
}

For an own-timesheet, only edit_own_timesheet is required. The voter does not look at the new project being submitted; it only validates the existing record's ownership.

Form replays user-controlled project ID into the access query

src/Form/TimesheetEditForm.php:60-71:

$isNew = true;
if (isset($options['data']) && $options['data'] instanceof Timesheet) {
    ...
    if (null !== $entry->getId()) {
        $isNew = false;
    }
    ...
}
$this->addProject($builder, $isNew, $project, $customer);

src/Form/FormTrait.php:59-100:

$builder->addEventListener(
    FormEvents::PRE_SUBMIT,
    function (FormEvent $event) use ($builder, $project, $customer, $isNew, $options): void {
        $data = $event->getData();
        $customer = \array_key_exists('customer', $data) && $data['customer'] !== '' ? $data['customer'] : null;
        $project = \array_key_exists('project', $data) && $data['project'] !== '' ? $data['project'] : $project;

        $event->getForm()->add('project', ProjectType::class, array_merge($options, [
            'group_by' => null,
            'query_builder' => function (ProjectRepository $repo) use ($builder, $project, $customer, $isNew) {
                $project = \is_string($project) ? (int) $project : $project;
                ...
                if ($isNew && \is_int($project)) {
                    $project = $repo->find($project);
                    if ($project !== null) {
                        if (!$project->getCustomer()->isVisible()) { ... $project = null; }
                        elseif (!$project->isVisible())            { $project = null; }
                    }
                }
                ...
                $query = new ProjectFormTypeQuery($project, $customer);
                $query->setUser($builder->getOption('user'));
                $query->setWithCustomer(true);
                return $repo->getQueryBuilderForFormType($query);
            },
        ]));
    }
);

Two problems compound:

  1. The visibility re-check on line 73 is gated on $isNew. For PATCH, $isNew = false, so the closure passes the attacker-supplied ID straight through.
  2. Even when $isNew = true (POST), the re-check only validates isVisible() — it does not validate team membership.

The query-builder unconditionally accepts the submitted ID

src/Repository/ProjectRepository.php:150-208:

public function getQueryBuilderForFormType(ProjectFormTypeQuery $query): QueryBuilder
{
    ...
    $mainQuery = $qb->expr()->andX();
    $mainQuery->add($qb->expr()->eq('p.visible', ':visible'));
    $mainQuery->add($qb->expr()->eq('c.visible', ':customer_visible'));
    if (!$query->isIgnoreDate()) { ... }
    if ($query->hasCustomers()) { ... }

    $permissions = $this->getPermissionCriteria($qb, $query->getUser(), $query->getTeams());
    if ($permissions->count() > 0) {
        $mainQuery->add($permissions);
    }

    $outerQuery = $qb->expr()->orX();
    if ($query->hasProjects()) {
        $outerQuery->add($qb->expr()->in('p.id', ':project'));     // <-- unconditional
        $qb->setParameter('project', $query->getProjects());
    }
    ...
    $outerQuery->add($mainQuery);
    $qb->andWhere($outerQuery);
    return $qb;
}

The final WHERE clause is roughly:

WHERE (p.id IN (:project)) OR (p.visible AND c.visible AND <date> AND <team-ACL>)

Because :project is the submitted ID itself, the first branch matches unconditionally, completely bypassing the team-ACL applied by getPermissionCriteria. Symfony's EntityType happily resolves the foreign Project entity, the form passes validation, and the timesheet is persisted with the new project_id.

No downstream validation closes the gap

  • TimesheetService::saveTimesheetupdateTimesheet (src/Timesheet/TimesheetService.php:154-177) is explicitly documented as not validating.
  • TimesheetBasicValidator only validates begin/end and project/activity coherence.
  • TimesheetDeactivatedValidator::validateActivityAndProject (src/Validator/Constraints/TimesheetDeactivatedValidator.php:36-42) returns early for non-running existing timesheets.
  • No validator anywhere in the timesheet pipeline checks that the project's team membership intersects the acting user's teams.

A PoC was provided, but removed for security reasons.

Impact

  • Integrity: any authenticated user can attribute their own tracked time to any project ID in the database — including projects belonging to teams/customers they cannot see. This pollutes per-project budgets, billing exports and reports for other teams. There is no in-app warning that records belonging to outsiders have been added.
  • Confidentiality: by reading the timesheet back via ?full=true, the attacker obtains serialized project and customer details (name, currency, start/end dates, customer hierarchy) which would normally be filtered by the team ACL.
  • Privilege model: the edit_own_timesheet permission is part of the default ROLE_USER, so the bypass is reachable by every regular user without any administrator action.

The blast radius is bounded by what an attacker can persist (their own timesheet rows) and what the ?full=true serializer exposes — there is no direct ability to modify other teams' existing data.

Solution

  • The FormTrait was updated to only pass the project forward for new timesheets
  • A new TimesheetTeamAccessValidatorwas added, which checks if project or activity were changed. If that is the case, the team access permission is checked first

Find out more at https://www.kimai.org/en/security/ghsa-vrr2-g9gh-c3jc

References

@kevinpapst kevinpapst published to kimai/kimai Jun 11, 2026
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Jul 13, 2026
Reviewed Jul 13, 2026
Last updated Jul 13, 2026

Severity

Moderate

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v4 base metrics

Exploitability Metrics
Attack Vector Network
Attack Complexity Low
Attack Requirements None
Privileges Required Low
User interaction None
Vulnerable System Impact Metrics
Confidentiality Low
Integrity Low
Availability None
Subsequent System Impact Metrics
Confidentiality None
Integrity None
Availability None

CVSS v4 base metrics

Exploitability Metrics
Attack Vector: This metric reflects the context by which vulnerability exploitation is possible. This metric value (and consequently the resulting severity) will be larger the more remote (logically, and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerable system. The assumption is that the number of potential attackers for a vulnerability that could be exploited from across a network is larger than the number of potential attackers that could exploit a vulnerability requiring physical access to a device, and therefore warrants a greater severity.
Attack Complexity: This metric captures measurable actions that must be taken by the attacker to actively evade or circumvent existing built-in security-enhancing conditions in order to obtain a working exploit. These are conditions whose primary purpose is to increase security and/or increase exploit engineering complexity. A vulnerability exploitable without a target-specific variable has a lower complexity than a vulnerability that would require non-trivial customization. This metric is meant to capture security mechanisms utilized by the vulnerable system.
Attack Requirements: This metric captures the prerequisite deployment and execution conditions or variables of the vulnerable system that enable the attack. These differ from security-enhancing techniques/technologies (ref Attack Complexity) as the primary purpose of these conditions is not to explicitly mitigate attacks, but rather, emerge naturally as a consequence of the deployment and execution of the vulnerable system.
Privileges Required: This metric describes the level of privileges an attacker must possess prior to successfully exploiting the vulnerability. The method by which the attacker obtains privileged credentials prior to the attack (e.g., free trial accounts), is outside the scope of this metric. Generally, self-service provisioned accounts do not constitute a privilege requirement if the attacker can grant themselves privileges as part of the attack.
User interaction: This metric captures the requirement for a human user, other than the attacker, to participate in the successful compromise of the vulnerable system. This metric determines whether the vulnerability can be exploited solely at the will of the attacker, or whether a separate user (or user-initiated process) must participate in some manner.
Vulnerable System Impact Metrics
Confidentiality: This metric measures the impact to the confidentiality of the information managed by the VULNERABLE SYSTEM due to a successfully exploited vulnerability. Confidentiality refers to limiting information access and disclosure to only authorized users, as well as preventing access by, or disclosure to, unauthorized ones.
Integrity: This metric measures the impact to integrity of a successfully exploited vulnerability. Integrity refers to the trustworthiness and veracity of information. Integrity of the VULNERABLE SYSTEM is impacted when an attacker makes unauthorized modification of system data. Integrity is also impacted when a system user can repudiate critical actions taken in the context of the system (e.g. due to insufficient logging).
Availability: This metric measures the impact to the availability of the VULNERABLE SYSTEM resulting from a successfully exploited vulnerability. While the Confidentiality and Integrity impact metrics apply to the loss of confidentiality or integrity of data (e.g., information, files) used by the system, this metric refers to the loss of availability of the impacted system itself, such as a networked service (e.g., web, database, email). Since availability refers to the accessibility of information resources, attacks that consume network bandwidth, processor cycles, or disk space all impact the availability of a system.
Subsequent System Impact Metrics
Confidentiality: This metric measures the impact to the confidentiality of the information managed by the SUBSEQUENT SYSTEM due to a successfully exploited vulnerability. Confidentiality refers to limiting information access and disclosure to only authorized users, as well as preventing access by, or disclosure to, unauthorized ones.
Integrity: This metric measures the impact to integrity of a successfully exploited vulnerability. Integrity refers to the trustworthiness and veracity of information. Integrity of the SUBSEQUENT SYSTEM is impacted when an attacker makes unauthorized modification of system data. Integrity is also impacted when a system user can repudiate critical actions taken in the context of the system (e.g. due to insufficient logging).
Availability: This metric measures the impact to the availability of the SUBSEQUENT SYSTEM resulting from a successfully exploited vulnerability. While the Confidentiality and Integrity impact metrics apply to the loss of confidentiality or integrity of data (e.g., information, files) used by the system, this metric refers to the loss of availability of the impacted system itself, such as a networked service (e.g., web, database, email). Since availability refers to the accessibility of information resources, attacks that consume network bandwidth, processor cycles, or disk space all impact the availability of a system.
CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:L/VI:L/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N

EPSS score

Weaknesses

Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key

The system's authorization functionality does not prevent one user from gaining access to another user's data or record by modifying the key value identifying the data. Learn more on MITRE.

CVE ID

CVE-2026-52820

GHSA ID

GHSA-vrr2-g9gh-c3jc

Source code

Credits

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