CVE-2026-49283: SimpleSAMLphp HTTP-Artifact TLS validator confusion allows cross-IdP authentication bypass

Severity: high (CVSS 8.7 v3.1)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.5% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2026-08-19 · updated 2026-09-18
Weakness: CWE-295

Description

The SimpleSAMLphp SAML2 library is a PHP library for SAML2 related functionality. Prior to versions 4.19.3, 4.20.2, 5.0.6, and 6.2.1, the HTTPArtifact::receive() flow can treat an unsigned embedded SAML Response as cryptographically valid for the wrong identity provider. SOAPClient::addSSLValidator() attaches a TLS-based validator to the outer SOAP ArtifactResponse, while the embedded Response receives a validator that delegates to the outer message and is later checked against metadata selected from the embedded response issuer rather than necessarily the artifact issuer. SOAPClient::validateSSL() returns normally when the TLS public key does not match the key being validated, and SAML2\Message::validate() treats a validator call that does not throw as successful. In a multi-IdP federation, a malicious or lower-trust IdP can therefore provide an ArtifactResponse containing an unsigned Response that claims a higher-trust victim IdP as issuer and authenticate as arbitrary users with attacker-chosen assertion attributes, NameID, and session data. This issue is fixed in versions 4.19.3, 4.20.2, 5.0.6, and 6.2.1.

Affected products

simplesamlphp saml2: before 4.19.3; from 4.20.0, < 4.20.2; from 5.0.0, < 5.0.6; from 6.0.0, < 6.2.1

References

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