Impact A user can submit a request that exploits a SQL Injection vulnerability in Payload.

You are affected if: - You use an affected Payload version. - Untrusted users can query readable collections using dynamic filters or joins.

You are not affected if you use MongoDB (@payloadcms/mongodb).

Patches Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.88.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.27.

Workarounds Upgrading to a patched version is recommended. Until you can upgrade, restrict untrusted users from supplying dynamic query filters or join parameters and limit read access to affected collections.

Impact

An attacker can submit a request to a specific endpoint that permits collection documents to be updated regardless of access control and field level access control.

You are affected if:

- You are configuring orderable: true with any collection or join field.

Patches

In the patched version access control is properly enforced.

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Impact An unauthenticated user could cause unintended application behavior when the Import Export plugin is enabled, allowing an attacker to submit and execute remote code (RCE).

Applications that do not use @payloadcms/plugin-import-export are not affected.

Patches Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.88.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.27.

Workarounds Upgrading is recommended. Until then, disable the Import Export plugin or restrict access to its endpoints.

Impact

Payload's duplicate operation copies field values from the source document even when a field is hidden, or its access.read or access.create rule would reject the value for that caller.

The disableDuplicate collection setting, enabled by default on auth collections, did not stop this.

Patches

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds

Add a beforeDuplicate field hook to fields and set the value to empty or your default value.

Impact

Under certain field configurations, Payload could include unintended values in the authentication token issued at login.

You are affected if:

- You use an affected Payload version and have configured a custom field option that maps a field to a reserved authentication claim name.

Patches Payload now restricts which field configuration options can influence the contents of the authentication token.

Users should upgrade payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds There is no complete workaround. Users should upgrade payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Impact

A malicious SVG file upload could bypass sanitization, be stored, and execute attacker-controlled JavaScript (XSS) after a user downloads it and opens it.

You are affected if:

- You have a collection configured to upload and allow SVG files which can then be downloaded by users.

Patches

The fix validates SVG content on every upload path and hardens SVG/XML delivery so stored SVGs cannot frame attacker content.

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds

Disallow SVG uploads, or serve uploaded SVGs as downloads with Content-Disposition: attachment and a strict CSP. These mitigations reduce exposure but do not replace upgrading when the patched release is available.

Impact Under certain local upload configurations, an uploaded XML file and stylesheet could execute JavaScript in the Payload origin when a logged-in user opens the file.

You are affected if: - You accept XML uploads (accepted by default).

Patches Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds Disallow XML/XSL uploads.

Impact A crafted request to the public first-register operation can be used to perform a RCE exploit.

You are affected if:

- You use local auth strategy and your application remains without an initial user created

Patches

In the patched version data submission to create first user is properly sanitized.

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Impact Under certain conditions, an authenticated user with permission to modify uploads could cause unintended files to be removed during file cleanup. This may result in data loss or service disruption.

You are affected if: - You use Payload upload collections with local file storage. - Untrusted authenticated users can update or delete uploads.

Deployments that restrict upload management to trusted users are less exposed.

Patches Payload now validates uploaded filenames and ensures file cleanup remains within the configured upload directory.

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds Restrict upload update and deletion operations to trusted users and validate submitted filenames. These measures are temporary mitigations. Upgrading to a patched version is recommended.

Impact

Users with read access to other user documents could access their active API keys. An exposed key grants the target account’s permissions until rotated or disabled.

You are affected if:

- An authentication collection enables useAPIKey. - Users have read access to other user documents containing active API keys.

Patches

Users should upgrade payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds

Disable useAPIKey or restrict users to reading only their own authentication document. Rotate any API key that may have been exposed.

Impact

When an auth collection defined a field-level access.update restriction on the password field, the restriction was not enforced on the server correctly.

Patches

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Impact

Under certain external upload configurations, Payload could send authentication data to a destination that was not verified as trusted. If the affected request contained a valid session, this could expose that session to an unintended recipient.

You are affected if:

- You have enabled external URL-based upload retrieval, where authenticated requests can trigger it.

Patches

Payload now validates the destination before forwarding authentication data and reapplies that validation when a request changes destination.

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds It is recommended to update all Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

If you cannot, a valid workaround exists: - Disable external URL-based upload retrieval where practical. - If you cannot disable it, configure the upload header filter to remove authentication data from outbound file requests. - Restrict access to the affected upload functionality.

Impact

Token refresh and password reset responses could return fields that the requesting user did not have access to.

You are affected if:

- An authentication collection contains hidden or read-restricted fields.

Patches

Authentication responses now apply field access and hidden-field filtering before returning user documents. Full user documents remain available server-side for access control.

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Custom authentication strategies remain responsible for filtering user documents returned through custom responses.

Workarounds

There is no complete workaround. Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Impact

A user with query access could use polymorphic join filters to infer hidden or read-restricted field values, including password-reset tokens.

You are affected if:

- You use an affected Payload version. - Users can query a collection with a polymorphic join to sensitive fields.

Patches

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds

There is no complete workaround. Restricting read access to sensitive collections reduces exposure but does not replace upgrading.

Impact Under certain conditions, sorting readable records could reveal limited information about fields the requester was not permitted to read.

You are affected if untrusted users can query a collection, control its sorting, and sort by protected fields.

Patches Payload now applies field-level access checks to sort fields before executing queries.

Users should upgrade to >= 3.88.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.27.

Workarounds Upgrading is recommended. Until then, prevent untrusted users from controlling sort parameters or restrict their access to affected collections.

Impact

A readable collection could expose information about protected documents in a related collection.

You are affected if:

- You expose a readable collection with a relationship to a collection protected by access.read where constraints.

Patches

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds

There is no complete workaround. Upgrade Payload packages >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Impact

An unauthenticated attacker who knows an account’s email address or username could trigger Payload’s account lockout mechanism and prevent that user from signing in.

You are affected if:

Using an affected Payload version with an auth-enabled collection that uses local authentication and account lockout.

Applications that do not use Payload local authentication are not affected.

Patches

Successful password resets now clear the account’s lockout state. The forgot-password flow also enforces a configurable minimum interval between reset emails, which defaults to 15 seconds.

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Payload uses JSON Web Tokens (JWT) for authentication. After log out JWT is not invalidated, which allows an attacker who has stolen or intercepted token to freely reuse it until expiration date (which is by default set to 2 hours, but can be changed).

This issue has been fixed in version 3.44.0 of Payload.

Impact Under certain conditions, an attacker can craft a redirect link that sends a guest user to an untrusted destination after authenticating.

Patches Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.88.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.27.

Workarounds Upgrading is recommended. Until then, remove user-controlled redirect values from authentication flows or restrict them to known local paths.

Impact The password-hashing configuration used a lower work factor than what is recommended.

Patches Payload now uses stronger password-hashing parameters and transparently upgrades older hashes following a successful login.

Users should upgrade Payload packages to >= 3.90.0 or >= 4.0.0-canary.34.

Workarounds Upgrading is recommended. Until you can upgrade, protect database copies and backups from unauthorized access and require strong, unique passwords.

A Session Fixation vulnerability existed in Payload's SQLite adapter due to identifier reuse during account creation. A malicious attacker could create a new account, save its JSON Web Token (JWT), and then delete the account, which did not invalidate the JWT. As a result, the next newly created user would receive the same identifier, allowing the attacker to reuse the JWT to authenticate and perform actions as that user.

This issue has been fixed in version 3.44.0 of Payload.