Summary

The SSRF validation in Craft CMS’s GraphQL Asset mutation performs DNS resolution separately from the HTTP request. This Time-of-Check-Time-of-Use (TOCTOU) vulnerability enables DNS rebinding attacks, where an attacker’s DNS server returns different IP addresses for validation compared to the actual request.

This is a bypass of the security fix for CVE-2025-68437 (GHSA-x27p-wfqw-hfcc) that allows access to all blocked IPs, not just IPv6 endpoints.

Severity

Bypass of cloud metadata SSRF protection for all blocked IPs

Required Permissions

Exploitation requires GraphQL schema permissions for:

• Edit assets in the <VolumeName> volume
• Create assets in the <VolumeName> volume

These permissions may be granted to:

• Authenticated users with appropriate GraphQL schema access
• Public Schema (if misconfigured with write permissions)

Technical Details

Vulnerable Code Flow

The code at src/gql/resolvers/mutations/Asset.php performs two separate DNS lookups:

// VALIDATION PHASE: First DNS resolution at time T1
private function validateHostname(string $url): bool
{
    $hostname = parse_url($url, PHP_URL_HOST);
    $ip = gethostbyname($hostname);  // DNS Lookup #1 - Returns safe IP

    if (in_array($ip, [
        '169.254.169.254',   // AWS, GCP, Azure IMDS
        '169.254.170.2',     // AWS ECS metadata
        '100.100.100.200',   // Alibaba Cloud
        '192.0.0.192',       // Oracle Cloud
    ])) {
        return false;  // Check passes - IP looks safe
    }
    return true;
}

// ... time gap between validation and request ...

// REQUEST PHASE: Second DNS resolution at time T2 (inside Guzzle)
$response = $client->get($url);  // DNS Lookup #2 - Guzzle resolves DNS AGAIN
                                  // Now returns 169.254.169.254!

Root Cause

Two separate DNS lookups occur:

1. Validation: gethostbyname() in validateHostname()
2. Request: Guzzle's internal DNS resolution via libcurl

An attacker controlling a DNS server can return different IPs for each query.

Bypass Mechanism

+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Attacker's DNS Server: evil.attacker.com                                    |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Query 1 (Validation - T1):                                                  |
|   Request:  A record for evil.attacker.com                                  |
|   Response: 1.2.3.4 (safe IP, TTL: 0)                                       |
|   Result:   Validation PASSES                                               |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Query 2 (Guzzle Request - T2):                                              |
|   Request:  A record for evil.attacker.com                                  |
|   Response: 169.254.169.254 (metadata IP, TTL: 0)                           |
|   Result:   Request goes to blocked IP -> CREDENTIALS STOLEN                |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+

Target Endpoints via DNS Rebinding

DNS rebinding allows access to all blocked IPs:

Attack Scenario

1. Attacker sets up DNS server with alternating responses
2. Attacker sends mutation with url: "http://evil.attacker.com/latest/meta-data/"
3. First DNS query returns safe IP (e.g., 1.2.3.4) → validation passes
4. Second DNS query returns metadata IP (169.254.169.254) → request to metadata
5. Attacker retrieves credentials from ANY cloud provider
6. Attacker can now achieve code execution by creating new instances with their SSH key

Remediation

Fix: DNS Pinning with CURLOPT_RESOLVE

Pin the DNS resolution - use the same resolved IP for both validation and request:

private function validateHostname(string $url): bool
{
    $hostname = parse_url($url, PHP_URL_HOST);

    // Resolve once
    $ip = gethostbyname($hostname);

    // Validate the resolved IP
    if (in_array($ip, [
        '169.254.169.254', '169.254.170.2',
        '100.100.100.200', '192.0.0.192',
    ])) {
        return false;
    }

    // Store for later use
    $this->pinnedDNS[$hostname] = $ip;

    return true;
}

// When making the request - CRITICAL: Use pinned IP
protected function makeRequest(string $url): ResponseInterface
{
    $hostname = parse_url($url, PHP_URL_HOST);
    $ip = $this->pinnedDNS[$hostname] ?? null;

    $options = [];
    if ($ip) {
        // Force Guzzle/curl to use the SAME IP we validated
        $options['curl'] = [
            CURLOPT_RESOLVE => [
                "$hostname:80:$ip",
                "$hostname:443:$ip"
            ]
        ];
    }

    return $this->client->get($url, $options);
}

Alternative: Single Resolution with Immediate Use

// Resolve to IP and use IP directly in URL
$ip = gethostbyname($hostname);

if (in_array($ip, $blockedIPs)) {
    return false;
}

// Make request directly to IP with Host header
$client->get("http://$ip" . parse_url($url, PHP_URL_PATH), [
    'headers' => [
        'Host' => $hostname
    ]
]);

Additional Mitigations

Resources

• craftcms/cms@a4cf3fb
• GHSA-x27p-wfqw-hfcc - Original SSRF vulnerability (CVE-2025-68437)
• DNSrebinder - Lightweight Python DNS server for testing DNS rebinding vulnerabilities; responds with legitimate IP for first N queries, then rebinds to target IP
• Singularity DNS Rebinding Tool
• rbndr DNS Rebinding Service
• DNS Rebinding Attacks Explained
• CURLOPT_RESOLVE Documentation
• OWASP SSRF Prevention Cheat Sheet

References

• GHSA-gp2f-7wcm-5fhx
• GHSA-x27p-wfqw-hfcc
• craftcms/cms@a4cf3fb
• https://curl.se/libcurl/c/CURLOPT_RESOLVE.html
• https://github.com/mogwailabs/DNSrebinder
• https://github.com/nccgroup/singularity
• https://github.com/taviso/rbndr
• https://unit42.paloaltonetworks.com/dns-rebinding
• https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-27127