CVE-2026-52822
Published:July 14, 2026
Updated:August 02, 2026
Summary Kimai 2.56.0 contains an authenticated authorization bypass in the timesheet "restart" and "duplicate" workflows. After a user loses access to a project, the user can still derive a new timesheet from one of their historical entries and create a new record under that now-unauthorized project and activity combination. This is a permission revocation bypass with persistent write impact. The issue affects both "restart" and "duplicate", which trust ownership of an old timesheet more than the user's current access to the underlying project, activity, and customer. Details The issue affects the following operations: - "PATCH /api/timesheets/{id}/restart" - "PATCH /api/timesheets/{id}/duplicate" The root cause is that authorization gives too much weight to the fact that the original timesheet belongs to the current user. In "src/Voter/TimesheetVoter.php", the "_own_timesheet" branch is evaluated before team-based access checks. The restart/duplicate capability check also verifies only object visibility, not whether the current user still has team-based access to the referenced objects. In "src/API/TimesheetController.php", the restart flow copies the historical "project" and "activity" into a new candidate timesheet. The duplicate flow similarly clones the historical record and saves it. In "src/Timesheet/TimesheetService.php", creation of a new running entry still relies on "isGranted('start', $timesheet)". For historical entries that belong to the current user, this logic can still succeed through the "_own_timesheet" branch even after project access has been revoked. As a result, normal creation pages correctly stop offering the revoked project, but "restart" and "duplicate" can still create new records under it. The same weakness also affects the Web duplicate flow because the UI path ultimately calls the same save logic in "src/Controller/TimesheetAbstractController.php": A PoC was provided, but removed for security reasons. Impact This vulnerability allows a user to keep writing new time entries into a project after project access has been revoked. That undermines administrative access-control changes and can pollute project time tracking, budget calculations, statistics, reports, and invoicing workflows. Because both "restart" and "duplicate" can reuse historical project/activity bindings, old timesheet records effectively become reusable capability tokens that survive later access-control changes. This is not a UI artifact or a caching problem: new database rows are persisted after revocation. Solution The metoid "TimesheetVoter::canStart()" now checks team access for project and activity. This verification is used for new timesheets and also for the "duplication" and "restart" workflows. See "https://www.kimai.org/en/security/ghsa-c6w6-57jj-62vh" (https://www.kimai.org/en/security/ghsa-c6w6-57jj-62vh) for more information.
Affected Packages
kimai/kimai (PHP):
Affected version(s) >=dev-release-1.12 <2.58.0Fix Suggestion:
Update to version 2.58.0Related Resources (2)
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Contact UsCVSS v4
Base Score:
5.3
Attack Vector
NETWORK
Attack Complexity
LOW
Attack Requirements
NONE
Privileges Required
LOW
User Interaction
NONE
Vulnerable System Confidentiality
NONE
Vulnerable System Integrity
LOW
Vulnerable System Availability
NONE
Subsequent System Confidentiality
NONE
Subsequent System Integrity
NONE
Subsequent System Availability
NONE
CVSS v3
Base Score:
4.3
Attack Vector
NETWORK
Attack Complexity
LOW
Privileges Required
LOW
User Interaction
NONE
Scope
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality
NONE
Integrity
LOW
Availability
NONE