CVE-2026-65595: n8n before 2.29.8 and 2.30.1 Privilege Escalation via Token Exchange

Severity: high (CVSS 8.8 v3.1)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.7% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2026-07-22 · updated 2026-10-29
Weakness: CWE-269

Description

n8n before 2.30.1 and 2.29.8 assigns all Public API key scopes to JWTs issued through the Token Exchange module regardless of the acting user's role. On instances where the Token Exchange feature and Public API are enabled, a low-privileged user who can obtain a valid external JWT trusted by a configured issuer can use the resulting access token to invoke administrator-only Public API operations such as role escalation, user creation, and user deletion (role escalation requires an Advanced Permissions license), and, when unverified Community Package installation is enabled, achieve remote code execution.

Affected products

n8n-io n8n: before 2.29.8; 2.30.0 (and their updates) — fixed in 2.29.8
n8n-io n8n: from 2.30.0 before 2.30.1 — fixed in 2.30.1

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: n8n-io n8n 2.29.8; n8n-io n8n 2.30.1. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

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