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7.7
CVE-2026-65016: n8n Enterprise SSO Privilege Escalation before 1.123.64
CVE-2026-65016
CVE-2026-65016
GHSA-35q8-9mj6-wjmf
GHSA-35q8-9mj6-wjmf
Summary
If you use n8n Enterprise SSO, a user with the right settings and an attacker's claim can gain full control of your workflows, users, and settings. This is a serious risk because it lets an attacker do anything they want with your n8n instance. You should update to version 1.123.64 or later to fix this issue.
What to do
- Update GitHub Actions n8n to version 1.123.64.
- Update GitHub Actions n8n to version 2.30.1.
- Update GitHub Actions n8n to version 2.29.8.
Affected software
| Ecosystem | Vendor | Product | Affected versions |
|---|---|---|---|
| – | n8n-io | n8n |
< 1.123.64 < 2.30.1 < 2.29.8 |
| npm | GitHub Actions | n8n |
< 1.123.64 >= 2.30.0, < 2.30.1 >= 2.0.0-rc.0, < 2.29.8 Fix: upgrade to 1.123.64
|
Original title
n8n: SSO Instance-Role Provisioning Allows Privilege Escalation to Instance Owner
Original description
## Impact
n8n's Enterprise SSO instance-role provisioning maps a role claim asserted by the configured Identity Provider (IdP) to an n8n global role and applies it during authentication. The provisioning path did not prevent assignment of the `global:owner` role, unlike the token-exchange identity path, which explicitly rejects it. As a result, an SSO-authenticated user whose instance-role claim resolves to `global:owner` is provisioned as an instance owner, obtaining full administrative control over all workflows, credentials, users, and instance configuration.
This is a privilege-escalation issue that is exploitable only under specific conditions. It affects instances where Enterprise SSO is configured and instance-role provisioning is enabled via the `N8N_SSO_SCOPES_PROVISION_INSTANCE_ROLE` flag, which is disabled by default. Exploitation additionally requires the attacker to control the value of the instance-role claim issued by the IdP. As this claim is typically an administrator-managed attribute, exploitation generally requires control over the IdP or its claim-to-role mapping, or a permissive IdP configuration in which a lower-privileged user can influence the claim value. Deployments that do not use Enterprise SSO, or that have instance-role provisioning disabled, are not affected.
## Patches
The issue has been fixed in n8n versions 1.123.64, 2.29.8, and 2.30.1. Users should upgrade to one of these versions or later to remediate the vulnerability.
## Workarounds
If upgrading is not immediately possible, administrators should consider the following temporary mitigations:
- Disable instance-role provisioning by unsetting or setting `N8N_SSO_SCOPES_PROVISION_INSTANCE_ROLE=false`.
- Audit IdP claim mappings to ensure no user-controllable attribute can supply the instance-role claim value.
- Restrict SSO access to fully trusted users only.
These workarounds do not fully remediate the risk and should only be used as short-term mitigation measures.
n8n's Enterprise SSO instance-role provisioning maps a role claim asserted by the configured Identity Provider (IdP) to an n8n global role and applies it during authentication. The provisioning path did not prevent assignment of the `global:owner` role, unlike the token-exchange identity path, which explicitly rejects it. As a result, an SSO-authenticated user whose instance-role claim resolves to `global:owner` is provisioned as an instance owner, obtaining full administrative control over all workflows, credentials, users, and instance configuration.
This is a privilege-escalation issue that is exploitable only under specific conditions. It affects instances where Enterprise SSO is configured and instance-role provisioning is enabled via the `N8N_SSO_SCOPES_PROVISION_INSTANCE_ROLE` flag, which is disabled by default. Exploitation additionally requires the attacker to control the value of the instance-role claim issued by the IdP. As this claim is typically an administrator-managed attribute, exploitation generally requires control over the IdP or its claim-to-role mapping, or a permissive IdP configuration in which a lower-privileged user can influence the claim value. Deployments that do not use Enterprise SSO, or that have instance-role provisioning disabled, are not affected.
## Patches
The issue has been fixed in n8n versions 1.123.64, 2.29.8, and 2.30.1. Users should upgrade to one of these versions or later to remediate the vulnerability.
## Workarounds
If upgrading is not immediately possible, administrators should consider the following temporary mitigations:
- Disable instance-role provisioning by unsetting or setting `N8N_SSO_SCOPES_PROVISION_INSTANCE_ROLE=false`.
- Audit IdP claim mappings to ensure no user-controllable attribute can supply the instance-role claim value.
- Restrict SSO access to fully trusted users only.
These workarounds do not fully remediate the risk and should only be used as short-term mitigation measures.
Vulnerability type
CWE-639
Authorization Bypass Through User-Controlled Key
- https://github.com/n8n-io/n8n/security/advisories/GHSA-35q8-9mj6-wjmf vendor-advisory
- https://www.vulncheck.com/advisories/n8n-before-privilege-escalation-via-sso-ins... third-party-advisory
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-65016
- https://github.com/n8n-io/n8n/releases/tag/[email protected]
- https://github.com/n8n-io/n8n/releases/tag/[email protected]
- https://github.com/n8n-io/n8n/releases/tag/[email protected]
- https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-35q8-9mj6-wjmf
- https://github.com/n8n-io/n8n Product
Published: 22 Jul 2026 · Updated: 22 Jul 2026 · First seen: 22 Jul 2026