siyuan vulnerability

SiYuan is a self-hosted personal knowledge management system. In versions up to and including 3.8.3, the kernel's authentication guards (CheckAuth in kernel/model/session.go and IsSessionOriginAllowed in kernel/util/net.go) fail open when the HTTP Origin header is absent, on the incorrect assumption that any browser-initiated cross-site request carries an Origin. Because browsers omit Origin on cross-site top-level GET navigations and no-cors GET subresource loads — and the session cookie is SameSite=Lax — a single cross-site GET issued from any attacker-controlled web page is granted RoleAdministrator, both on default installations with no access-authorization code and on password-protected instances with a live session. Combined with content-type sniffing on the /api/network/proxy endpoint, which allows attacker-controlled HTML to be served under SiYuan's own origin, this permits an unauthenticated remote attacker to execute arbitrary script in the SiYuan origin (http://127.0.0.1:6806), invoke administrator APIs, and exfiltrate the persistent kernel API token. This issue is fixed in version 3.8.4.

Published 26 Sep 2026Updated 26 Sep 20262 sources
CVSS 8.6

What happened

SiYuan is a self-hosted personal knowledge management system. In versions up to and including 3.8.3, the kernel's authentication guards (CheckAuth in kernel/model/session.go and IsSessionOriginAllowed in kernel/util/net.go) fail open when the HTTP Origin header is absent, on the incorrect assumption that any browser-initiated cross-site request carries an Origin. Because browsers omit Origin on cross-site top-level GET navigations and no-cors GET subresource loads — and the session cookie is SameSite=Lax — a single cross-site GET issued from any attacker-controlled web page is granted RoleAdministrator, both on default installations with no access-authorization code and on password-protected instances with a live session. Combined with content-type sniffing on the /api/network/proxy endpoint, which allows attacker-controlled HTML to be served under SiYuan's own origin, this permits an unauthenticated remote attacker to execute arbitrary script in the SiYuan origin (http://127.0.0.1:6806), invoke administrator APIs, and exfiltrate the persistent kernel API token. This issue is fixed in version 3.8.4.

Affected versions

siyuan: before 3.8.4 (semver) Fixed: See vendor advisory.

Why it matters

Review the vendor advisory and exposure of the affected product to determine operational impact.

Detection & mitigation

  • Apply vendor-provided updates or mitigations.
  • Review affected product exposure and access logs.

Public PoC references

No public PoC reference has passed the current publication threshold.