CVE-2026-16895
A logic vulnerability (fail-open condition) has been identified within the Metasploit Framework's JSON-RPC web service interface. When an exception occurs during the database health check (db.check) and the environment variable MSF_WS_JSON_RPC_API_TOKEN is not explicitly set, the application resets the internal state flag msf.auth_initialized to false. The ApiToken Warden authentication strategy misinterprets this false value as an indicator that authentication is not initialized or required, thereby granting unauthenticated local access to the JSON-RPC request dispatcher.
What this means for your business
- FIRST's prediction model gives it a 0.2% chance of attack attempts being seen in the next 30 days, ranking above 5% of all known flaws.
What to do
- 1Ask your IT team or provider whether any of your systems use the affected product.
- 2If you do, follow the vendor's guidance. No patch reference has been published yet.
Not sure if your company is exposed?
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Scoring
- CVSS
- Not yet scored
- CVSS v4
- 5.1
- Weakness
- CWE-305
- Assigned by
- cve@rapid7.com
Dates
- Published
- 2026-08-27
- Last modified
- 2026-08-28
- Sources
- NVD