CVE-2026-40281
CriticalSummary
Gotenberg is a stateless API for PDF files that in versions 8.30.1 and earlier improperly validates metadata values. These values can contain newline characters, allowing injection of arbitrary ExifTool pseudo-tags, leading to serious security vulnerabilities.
Risk Assessment
An unauthenticated attacker can rename or move PDF files in the container filesystem, overwrite arbitrary files, or create symlinks and hard links at arbitrary paths.
Recommendation
It is recommended to update Gotenberg to a version that fixes the validation of metadata values to prevent injection and file manipulation.
Other vulnerabilities in Gotenberg API
See all- CVE-2026-42594High
Gotenberg, a PDF file API, has a vulnerability prior to version 8.32.0 that can lead to process crashes. The issue arises from improper context management during concurrent requests, causing a panic in the webhook goroutine.
- CVE-2026-42591High
Gotenberg is a stateless API for PDF files that, prior to version 8.32.0, passed uploaded documents directly to LibreOffice without inspecting their content. LibreOffice then fetched any embedded external URLs on its own, completely bypassing SSRF filters.
- CVE-2026-42596Critical
Gotenberg is an API for PDF files that prior to version 8.31.0 had a vulnerability in the downloadFrom and webhook features. The default deny-lists were bypassable, allowing unauthenticated attackers to access internal HTTP services.
- CVE-2026-42589Critical
Gotenberg is a PDF file API that, prior to version 8.31.0, did not validate keys in JSON objects sent to the /forms/pdfengines/metadata/write endpoint. Using a newline character in a JSON key allows for the injection of arbitrary ExifTool flags, leading to unauthenticated OS command execution.
Original NVD description (English source)
Gotenberg is a Docker-powered stateless API for PDF files. In versions 8.30.1 and earlier, the metadata write endpoint validates metadata keys for control characters but leaves metadata values unsanitized. A newline character in a metadata value splits the ExifTool stdin line into two separate arguments, allowing injection of arbitrary ExifTool pseudo-tags such as -FileName, -Directory, -SymLink, and -HardLink. This is a bypass of the incomplete key-sanitization fix introduced in v8.30.1. An unauthenticated attacker can rename or move any PDF being processed to an arbitrary path in the container filesystem, overwrite arbitrary files, or create symlinks and hard links at arbitrary paths.
Vulnerability data from NVD (NIST) · CISA KEV · EPSS