CVE-2026-33495: Ory Oathkeeper has an authentication bypass by usage of untrusted header

Vulnerability summary

CVE-2026-33495 is a medium (CVSS 6.5) Missing Authorization vulnerability in ory oathkeeper. EPSS estimates a 0.24% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 15.5% of scored vulnerabilities.

Timeline

1. 26-03-2026
   PublishedVulnerability first disclosed.
2. 26-03-2026
   Last modifiedVulnerability information updated.

Description

ORY Oathkeeper is an Identity & Access Proxy (IAP) and Access Control Decision API that authorizes HTTP requests based on sets of Access Rules. Ory Oathkeeper is often deployed behind other components like CDNs, WAFs, or reverse proxies. Depending on the setup, another component might forward the request to the Oathkeeper proxy with a different protocol (http vs. https) than the original request. In order to properly match the request against the configured rules, Oathkeeper considers the `X-Forwarded-Proto` header when evaluating rules. The configuration option `serve.proxy.trust_forwarded_headers` (defaults to false) governs whether this and other `X-Forwarded-*` headers should be trusted. Prior to version 26.2.0, Oathkeeper did not properly respect this configuration, and would always consider the `X-Forwarded-Proto` header. In order for an attacker to abuse this, an installation of Ory Oathkeeper needs to have distinct rules for HTTP and HTTPS requests. Also, the attacker needs to be able to trigger one but not the other rule. In this scenario, the attacker can send the same request but with the `X-Forwarded-Proto` header in order to trigger the other rule. We do not expect many configurations to meet these preconditions. Version 26.2.0 contains a patch. Ory Oathkeeper will correctly respect the `serve.proxy.trust_forwarded_headers` configuration going forward, thereby eliminating the attack scenario. We recommend upgrading to a fixed version even if the preconditions are not met. As an additional mitigation, it is generally recommended to drop any unexpected headers as early as possible when a request is handled, e.g. in the WAF.

• CWE-862Missing AuthorizationThe product does not perform an authorization check when an actor attempts to access a resource or perform an action.