What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities

CVE-2026-53870: Hermes Agent < 0.16.0 - Sensitive File Permission Vulnerability in Store Files

• Severity: medium (CVSS 5.5 v3.1)
• Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
• EPSS: 0.2% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
• Public exploit or detection template: none known
• Published: 2026-06-17 · updated 2026-10-26
• Weakness: CWE-276

Description

Hermes Agent before 0.16.0 creates response_store.db and webhook_subscriptions.json with world-readable permissions (mode 0o644), exposing conversation history and HMAC secrets to local users. Attackers with local filesystem access can read these files directly to obtain sensitive data including conversation history, tool payloads, prompts, and per-route HMAC secrets.

Affected products

• NousResearch hermes-agent: before 0.16.0 — fixed in 0.16.0

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: NousResearch hermes-agent 0.16.0. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

• https://github.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/commit/3bace071bfadf2d2bec2ee048471a31ec920e3e8
• https://github.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/pull/30917
• https://github.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/pull/31469
• https://github.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/releases/tag/v2026.6.5
• https://www.vulncheck.com/advisories/hermes-agent-sensitive-file-permission-vulnerability-in-store-files
• https://github.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/pull/30917

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