CVE-2025-59525 | Horilla has Improper Input Sanitization Leading to XSS and Admin Account Takeover

Exp

Horilla is a free and open source Human Resource Management System (HRMS). Prior to version 1.4.0, improper sanitization across the application allows XSS via uploaded SVG (and via allowed <embed>), which can be chained to execute JavaScript whenever users view impacted content (e.g., announcements). This can result in admin account takeover. This issue has been patched in version 1.4.0.

Published: 2025-09-24 Last update: 2025-09-29 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Analyzed，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2025-59525 is rated Exploit Available (50/100): CVSS High severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.03%). 2 public exploit reference(s) are indexed (Exploit-DB). Public exploits are available—assess exposure, apply mitigations, and prioritize patching.

Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.

Public exploit references (Exploit-DB) for CVE-2025-59525

EDB-ID Source Kind Published Link
— nvd_ref exploit_tag Exploit-DB ↗
— nvd_ref exploit_tag Exploit-DB ↗

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2025-59525

EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).

# Date Old EPSS score New EPSS score Delta (New - Old)
1 2026-02-20 0.05% 0.03% -0.02%
2 2025-12-01 0.04% 0.05% +0.01%
3 2025-09-25 — 0.04% —

Full EPSS history (3 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2025-59525

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
7.7 4.0 HIGH
CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:N/SC:N/SI:H/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Exploitation conditions are straightforward and stable.
Attack requirements (AT:N)
No additional preconditions are required beyond normal reachability.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No privileges are required.
User interaction (UI:N)
No user interaction is required.
Vulnerable system confidentiality impact (VC:N)
No confidentiality impact on the vulnerable system.
Vulnerable system integrity impact (VI:N)
No integrity impact on the vulnerable system.
Vulnerable system availability impact (VA:N)
No availability impact on the vulnerable system.
Subsequent system confidentiality impact (SC:N)
No confidentiality impact on subsequent systems.
Subsequent system integrity impact (SI:H)
High integrity impact on subsequent systems.
Subsequent system availability impact (SA:N)
No availability impact on subsequent systems.
Exploit maturity (threat) (E:X)
Not defined: no reliable threat intelligence; scoring assumes the worst case (equivalent to Attacked).
Confidentiality requirement (CR:X)
Not defined: insufficient information; scoring treats this like High (worst case).
Integrity requirement (IR:X)
Not defined: insufficient information; scoring treats this like High (worst case).
Availability requirement (AR:X)
Not defined: insufficient information; scoring treats this like High (worst case).
Modified attack vector (MAV:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base Attack Vector (AV).
Modified attack complexity (MAC:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base Attack Complexity (AC).
Modified attack requirements (MAT:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base Attack Requirements (AT).
Modified privileges required (MPR:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base Privileges Required (PR).
Modified user interaction (MUI:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base User Interaction (UI).
Modified vulnerable system confidentiality impact (MVC:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base VC metric.
Modified vulnerable system integrity impact (MVI:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base VI metric.
Modified vulnerable system availability impact (MVA:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base VA metric.
Modified subsequent system confidentiality impact (MSC:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base SC metric.
Modified subsequent system integrity impact (MSI:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base SI metric.
Modified subsequent system availability impact (MSA:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base SA metric.
Safety (supplemental) (S:X)
Not evaluated.
Automatable (supplemental) (AU:X)
Not evaluated.
Recovery (supplemental) (R:X)
Not evaluated.
Value density (supplemental) (V:X)
Not evaluated.
Vulnerability response effort (supplemental) (RE:X)
Not evaluated.
Provider urgency (supplemental) (U:X)
Not evaluated.
 — — [email protected]
6.1 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:L/I:L/A:N Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:R)
A real person has to do something—click, install, enable—otherwise it doesn’t land.
Scope (S:C)
Breaking this can reach past the original component and bite other resources—bigger blast radius.
Confidentiality (C:L)
Some sensitive info could get out, but not a total data dump.
Integrity (I:L)
Attackers could change some data, but it’s limited—not everything goes.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.
 2.8 2.7 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2025-59525

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2025-59525

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
horilla horilla < 1.4.0 cpe:2.3:a:horilla:horilla:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2025-59525

cvelogic Threat Intelligence