CriticalCVE-2025-68461

    RoundCube Webmail Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability (CVE-2025-68461)

    Published In CISA KEV since Sources: pwn.watch, Debian, CVE.org, Ubuntu, Debian LTS, BSI

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    What is affected, what to do

    Roundcube Webmail before 1.5.12 and 1.6 before 1.6.12 is prone to a Cross-Site-Scripting (XSS) vulnerability via the animate tag in an SVG document.

    The vulnerability is being actively exploited; treat it as a priority. Update Roundcube Webmail to version 1.5.12, Roundcube Webmail to version 1.6.12. Immediate actions, mitigation and detection rules are in the runbook below.

    Affected
    • Roundcube Webmail lt *..1.5.12
    • Roundcube Webmail lt 1.6.0..1.6.12
    Fixed in
    • Roundcube Webmail 1.5.12
    • Roundcube Webmail 1.6.12

    Not sure whether and how you are affected? Ask a question about this vulnerability

    Metrics

    7.2

    Priority

    XIEM Effective CVSS: highest available CVSS rating from NVD and vendor data.

    Source: Vendor (CNA), CVSS v3

    7.2

    CVSS v3

    Severity High on the scale from 0 to 10.

    Source: pwn.watch, Debian, CVE.org, Ubuntu, Debian LTS, BSI

    27.4 %

    EPSS score

    Elevated — model estimates 10-50% exploitation likelihood.

    Source: FIRST EPSS, percentile 98.1

    Show all metrics
    Severity
    Critical
    Priority (0–325)

    The priority score is a consolidated metric that condenses several individual signals into a single, action-guiding ranking: technical severity (CVSS), exploitation likelihood (EPSS), known-exploited status (KEV) and the context of the affected asset. The aim is to answer the only truly important question in vulnerability management: what first?

    Read in glossary
    225.66 Methodology
    Exploit maturity

    An exploit is code or a technique that specifically uses a concrete vulnerability to force unintended behaviour — such as executing code or escalating privileges. It is the tool that turns a theoretical flaw into a practical attack.

    Read in glossary
    actively exploitedSource: VulnCheck KEV (opens in a new tab) How we classify
    XIEM Effective CVSS

    XIEM® is the tiered managed-security operating model from NEOSEC and a registered trademark of NEOSEC GmbH. It extends classic SIEM — the central collection, normalisation and correlation of security-relevant events — with endpoint forensics, network visibility and deception technology, and consolidates them into three building tiers: Sentry, Orchestrate and Command.

    Read in glossary
    7.2 Methodology
    CVSS v3

    CVSS is the globally established, open standard for assessing the technical severity of a vulnerability on a scale from 0 to 10. It describes how easily a flaw can be exploited and what damage it can cause — but not how likely its actual exploitation is. CVSS and the complementary EPSS deliberately answer different questions.

    Read in glossary
    7.2
    EPSS score

    The EPSS score is the absolute model output for an individual vulnerability: the estimated probability of real-world exploitation within the next 30 days, expressed as a value between 0 and 1 (i.e. 0 % to 100 %). A score of 0.42 means „the model estimates a 42 % chance of real-world exploitation within 30 days“.

    Read in glossary
    27.4 %
    Elevated — model estimates 10-50% exploitation likelihood.
    EPSS percentile

    The EPSS percentile is the relative position of a vulnerability within all EPSS-scored CVEs, expressed as a value between 0 and 1. A percentile of 0.90 means „this CVE has a higher EPSS score than 90 % of all other scored CVEs“. Unlike the EPSS score, it is not a probability — but a positioning within a ranking.

    Read in glossary
    98.1
    Critical — this CVE ranks in the top fifth of all CVEs scored today (rank ≥ 80%).
    KEV status

    The KEV catalogue is a list maintained by the US authority CISA of vulnerabilities for which active exploitation in the wild has been confirmed. It answers not the question „how severe?“ but „is it already being attacked?“ — thereby sharply prioritising patching.

    Read in glossary
    Actively exploited
    Published
    In CISA KEV since

    The KEV catalogue is a list maintained by the US authority CISA of vulnerabilities for which active exploitation in the wild has been confirmed. It answers not the question „how severe?“ but „is it already being attacked?“ — thereby sharply prioritising patching.

    Read in glossary
    CISA assessment (SSVC)
    Exploitation: active · automatable · Technical impact: total
    Source: CISA Vulnrichment, as of 21 February 2026
    CWE

    CWE is a catalogue of typical weakness types in software and hardware — such as flawed input validation, unsafe memory handling or poor authentication. Where a CVE names a concrete vulnerability in a concrete product, a CWE describes the underlying class of defect.

    Read in glossary
    CWE-79

    Response and mitigation

    Why act now?

    Prioritisation rationale

    Roundcube XSS flaws are a recurring tool in targeted campaigns against government, defence and infrastructure organisations. A crafted email is enough: simply viewing it runs script in the victim's webmail session, which attackers use to exfiltrate mail, harvest credentials and plant persistent forwarding rules. The flaw is network-reachable without authentication, needs only the user to open a message, and crosses a scope boundary. It sits among the CVEs with very high exploitation likelihood, although CISA lists no known ransomware use. KRITIS and NIS2 entities running internet-facing Roundcube should treat this as urgent and patch within 24-72 h. Internal-only instances can follow, but still within the regular patch cycle.

    1. Runbook step 1

      Immediate response (0-24 h)

      • Inventory: Find every Roundcube instance, including those embedded in hosting control panels, groupware bundles and appliances. Check the version via the "About" dialog or RCMAIL_VERSION in program/include/iniset.php. Anything before 1.5.12, and any 1.6.x before 1.6.12, is vulnerable.
      • Patch: Upgrade to Roundcube 1.6.12 (1.6 branch) or 1.5.12 (1.5 LTS branch). Ubuntu ESM hosts should install roundcube 1.6.11+dfsg-1ubuntu0.26.04.1~esm1. Other distributions have patches available from their package maintainers — look up the exact version in the distro advisory. After upgrading, restart PHP-FPM/the web server and clear caches (bin/update.sh, temp/).
      • Reduce exposure until patched: Put internet-facing webmail behind VPN/ZTNA or an IP allowlist. Prioritise mailboxes belonging to executives, administration and IT admins.
      • Quarantine SVG content at the mail gateway: Hold inbound messages carrying image/svg+xml attachments or inline <svg> blocks that contain <animate. Retro-hunt mail already delivered over the past weeks.
      • Handle suspected compromise: For users who opened suspicious messages, kill all Roundcube sessions (purge the session table or the affected rows), force password resets, and review Sieve forwarding rules and identities for tampering.

    2. Runbook step 2

      Mitigation layers

      • Roundcube configuration: Temporarily disable HTML rendering in config.inc.php with $config['prefer_html'] = false; and $config['show_images'] = 0;. This shrinks the attack path through rendered HTML/SVG. Add both options to dont_override so users cannot revert them.
      • Web server hardening: Deploy a strict Content-Security-Policy such as script-src 'self'; object-src 'none'; frame-ancestors 'self', after testing for inline-script breakage. Issue session cookies with HttpOnly, Secure and SameSite=Strict to make XSS-driven session theft harder.
      • WAF/reverse proxy: Inspect image/svg+xml bodies for <animate[^>]+attributeName\s*=\s*["']?(href|xlink:href) or values\s*=\s*["'][^"']*javascript:. Force Content-Disposition: attachment on SVG served via _action=get so it is never rendered inline.
      • Segmentation and egress: Limit outbound connections from the webmail server and from user browsers through the proxy. Block newly registered and uncategorised domains to frustrate exfiltration of mailbox content.
      • IAM: Enforce MFA on webmail (2FA plugin or an upstream IdP) so that harvested credentials are useless without the second factor. Keep privileged mailboxes off webmail entirely.

    3. Runbook step 3

      Detection rules

      • Mail gateway/archive: Hunt for SVG content combining <animate with href/javascript:. Sigma shape: selection: body|contains|all: ['<svg', '<animate', 'javascript:']. Correlate hits with the list of recipients who opened the message.
      • Web access logs: Flag a message view (_task=mail&_action=show or _action=preview) followed within seconds, in the same session, by unusual actions: _action=plugin.managesieve-save, _action=save-identity, _task=settings&_action=save-prefs, or bulk _action=viewsource/_action=download. SPL idea: index=web uri_query="*_task=mail*_action=show*" | transaction session maxspan=60s | search uri_query="*managesieve-save*" OR uri_query="*viewsource*".
      • Roundcube logs (logs/userlogins, logs/errors): Watch for logins to the same account from new IPs or ASNs shortly after a suspicious message was opened, which points to credential harvesting. Also watch for newly created external forwards.
      • Proxy/Zeek telemetry: Look for user browsers issuing POSTs to unknown domains immediately after loading webmail. In Zeek http.log, filter on method=POST, Referer = webmail host, and a destination outside the allowlist.
      • Mail server (Dovecot/Sieve): Alert on new redirect rules in Sieve scripts and on IMAP bulk FETCH activity originating from webmail sessions.

    Detection rules

    No NEOSEC detection rule is available for this vulnerability yet.

    Classification under NIS2 and CRA

    Rule-based classification from exploitation status and severity. It does not replace a case-by-case assessment.

    NIS2

    NIS2 is EU Directive (EU) 2022/2555 to raise the level of cybersecurity across the Union. It substantially broadens obligations compared with the first NIS directive: more sectors, mandatory risk management, staged reporting duties and personal accountability of senior management.

    Read in glossary
    Actively exploited: treat the vulnerability as a priority in vulnerability handling under Art. 21(2)(e) NIS2. If it is exploited in your environment, check the reporting obligation under Art. 23 (early warning within 24 hours).
    CRA

    The CRA is EU Regulation (EU) 2024/2847 setting horizontal cybersecurity requirements for „products with digital elements“ — from industrial controllers and software to connected consumer devices. For the first time manufacturers must ensure security across the entire product lifecycle, handle vulnerabilities and provide security updates.

    Read in glossary
    Since 11.09.2026, manufacturers of affected products with digital elements must report actively exploited vulnerabilities under Art. 14 CRA, with an early warning within 24 hours via ENISA's single reporting platform.
    ISO/IEC 27001

    ISO/IEC 27001 is the internationally leading standard for an information security management system (ISMS). It describes a risk-based, process-oriented framework to systematically plan, implement, review and improve information security.

    Read in glossary
    Control A.8.8, management of technical vulnerabilities: assess relevance to your systems, plan remediation and keep evidence.

    Description

    Roundcube Webmail before 1.5.12 and 1.6 before 1.6.12 is prone to a Cross-Site-Scripting (XSS) vulnerability via the animate tag in an SVG document.

    Source: pwn.watch, Debian Security Advisories, NVD (NIST), cvelistv5, CISA KEV Catalog, Ubuntu Security Notices, CVE.org (MITRE), Debian LTS Advisories, BSI CSAF, BSI WID Portal

    Affected products

    The following versions are affected. Older releases of the same product line are also vulnerable unless stated otherwise.

    Affected products
    Affected versionsFixed in
    RoundcubeWebmail
    • < 1.5.12
    • 1.6.0 – < 1.6.12
    • 1.5.12
    • 1.6.12
    roundcubewebmail
    • 1.6.0 – < 1.6.12
    • < 1.5.12
    • 1.6.12
    • 1.5.12
    Open SourceRoundcube
    • < 1.5.12
    • < 1.6.12
    • 1.5.12
    • 1.6.12

    Vendors and products

    Affected operating systems

    Affected operating systems
    Linuxdebianroundcubebookworm
    Linuxdebianroundcubebullseye
    Linuxdebianroundcubetrixie
    Linuxubunturoundcuberesolute

    Weakness classes (CWE)

    • CWE-79Improper Neutralization of Input During Web Page Generation ('Cross-site Scripting')

      Base

      The product does not neutralize or incorrectly neutralizes user-controllable input before it is placed in output that is used as a web page that is served to other users.

      Entry at MITRE CWE-79

    Public exploit references

    Publicly reported proof-of-concepts, exploit modules and detection templates for this vulnerability. NEOSEC links to the original sources only and does not provide any exploit code.

    Public exploit references
    CISA KEV CatalogCISA Known Exploited Vulnerability (opens in a new tab)cisa.govactively exploited

    References & sources

    • roundcube.netRoundcube Webmail — CVE-2025-68461Vendor advisory, pwn-watch
    • github.comroundcube/roundcubemail/commit/bfa032631c36b900e7444dfa278340b3…Patch
    • cisa.govknown-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog?field_cve=CVE-2025-68461government-resource, US government resource
    • pwn.watchpwn.watch: Roundcube Webmail: RoundCube Webmail Deserialization of Untrusted Data Vulnerabilitypwn-watch
    • roundcube.netRoundcube Webmail — CVE-2025-49113pwn-watch
    • NVD (NIST)NVD: CVE-2025-49113pwn-watch
    • NVD (NIST)NVD: CVE-2025-68461pwn-watch
    • cisa.govCISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities Catalogpwn-watch
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