EUVD-2025-209551
GHSA-q9qr-p283-j9rm
CVSS VectorNVD
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Lifecycle Timeline
7DescriptionNVD
GitLab has remediated an issue in GitLab CE/EE affecting all versions from 12.4 before 18.9.6, 18.10 before 18.10.4, and 18.11 before 18.11.1 that could have allowed an authenticated user to cause denial of service by overwhelming system resources under certain conditions due to insufficient resource allocation limits in the GraphQL API.
AnalysisAI
Authenticated users can trigger denial of service in GitLab by overwhelming system resources through the GraphQL API due to insufficient resource allocation limits. Affected versions span from 12.4 through 18.11.0 across three release branches. Publicly available exploit code exists, though active exploitation has not been confirmed in CISA KEV. CVSS 6.5 reflects moderate severity with high availability impact but requires valid authentication.
Technical ContextAI
The vulnerability resides in the GraphQL API layer of GitLab, which handles structured query processing for authenticated API consumers. CWE-770 (Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling) indicates that the API endpoint fails to enforce per-user or per-session resource quotas on query execution, computation time, or memory allocation. An authenticated attacker can craft deeply nested or computationally expensive GraphQL queries that consume CPU, memory, or other finite system resources without triggering protective rate limits or timeouts. The affected product spans all GitLab Community Edition and Enterprise Edition instances from version 12.4 onward, with the vulnerability present across multiple actively-maintained release branches (18.9, 18.10, 18.11).
RemediationAI
Apply the vendor-released patches immediately: upgrade to GitLab 18.9.6 or later for legacy instances, 18.10.4 or later for the 18.10 branch, and 18.11.1 or later for the 18.11 branch. See the official patch release announcement at https://about.gitlab.com/releases/2026/04/22/patch-release-gitlab-18-11-1-released/. As an interim compensating control, implement API rate limiting at the proxy or load balancer level (e.g., WAF rules limiting GraphQL queries per authenticated user per minute) to throttle expensive queries, though this does not address the root cause. Additionally, monitor GraphQL API logs for unusual query patterns (deeply nested selections, high execution time, resource consumption spikes) and alert on per-user query rates exceeding baseline. Restrict API token scope and implement short-lived token expiration (e.g., 24-hour max lifetime) to limit the window of compromise. Note that these controls may impact legitimate heavy API consumers; test thoroughly in staging before production deployment.
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