See how openhands compares to other vendors in security performance
OpenHands Software Agent SDK before 1.52.0 contains an unauthenticated remote code execution vulnerability where the DockerWorkspace and Apptainer workspace launchers bind the sandbox agent server to all network interfaces (0.0.0.0) with an empty sessionapikeys list, disabling authentication by default. Attackers who can reach the published container port can send unauthenticated HTTP and WebSocket requests to execute arbitrary shell commands as root in the sandbox, access the mounted workspace, and read plaintext secrets from the secrets store.
A vulnerability was determined in OpenHands up to 0.62.0. The affected element is the function initializerepo of the file OpenHands/resolver/sendpullrequest.py. This manipulation causes command injection. Remote exploitation of the attack is possible. The vendor deleted the original GitHub issue report. It appears that the affected path/file got removed in version 1.7.0.
Summary
A Command Injection vulnerability exists in the getgitdiff() method at openhands/runtime/utils/githandler.py:134. The path parameter from the /api/conversations/{conversationid}/git/diff API endpoint is passed unsanitized to a shell command, allowing authenticated attackers to execute arbitrary commands in the agent sandbox. The user is already allowed to instruct the agent to execute commands, but this bypasses the normal channels.
---
Details
Vulnerable Code Path
The vulnerability flows through these files:
1. API Endpoint (openhands/server/routes/files.py:267-277) python @app.get('/git/diff') async def gitdiff( path: str, # <-- User input from HTTP request ... ): ... diff = await callsyncfromasync(runtime.getgitdiff, path, cwd) # No sanitization
2. Runtime (openhands/runtime/base.py:1231-1233) python def getgitdiff(self, filepath: str, cwd: str) -> dict[str, str]: self.githandler.setcwd(cwd) return self.githandler.getgitdiff(filepath) # Passed directly
3. Vulnerable Method (openhands/runtime/utils/githandler.py:10-12, 134) python Command template with placeholder GITDIFFCMD = 'python3 /openhands/code/openhands/runtime/utils/gitdiff.py "{filepath}"'
Line 134 - VULNERABLE: User input directly interpolated result = self.execute(self.gitdiffcmd.format(filepath=filepath), self.cwd)
4. Shell Execution (openhands/runtime/utils/gitdiff.py:25-27) python def run(cmd: str, cwd: str) -> str: result = subprocess.run( args=cmd, shell=True, # <-- Enables shell metacharacter interpretation stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.PIPE, cwd=cwd )
Root Cause
The filepath parameter is directly interpolated into a shell command string using Python's .format() method without any sanitization. When this command is executed with shell=True, shell metacharacters like ", ;, and # are interpreted, allowing command injection.
Example: - Input: test"; id # - Constructed command: python3 /script.py "test"; id #" - Shell interprets as two commands: python3 /script.py "test" AND id
---
Impact
Who is Affected - All OpenHands deployments exposing the /api/conversations/{id}/git/diff endpoint - Any authenticated user can exploit this vulnerability,
Attack Capabilities An attacker can: 1. Execute arbitrary commands on the runtime container as root 2. Read sensitive files including .env, API keys, source code 3. Write arbitrary files to inject malicious code 4. Establish reverse shells for persistent access 5. Potentially escape the container if Docker is misconfigured
Mitigation
Users should update to the latest version of OpenHands that includes the changes from PR #13051. The fix replaces direct shell string formatting with proper argument array handling or rigorous path sanitization to prevent command chaining.