Skip to content

auth: Patreon provider assigns the same local user ID to every authenticated Patreon account, enabling cross‑user impersonation

Critical severity GitHub Reviewed Published Apr 22, 2026 in go-pkgz/auth • Updated May 13, 2026

Package

gomod github.com/go-pkgz/auth (Go)

Affected versions

>= 1.18.0, <= 1.25.1

Patched versions

1.25.2
gomod github.com/go-pkgz/auth/v2 (Go)
>= 2.0.0, <= 2.1.1
2.1.2

Description

Summary

The Patreon OAuth provider maps every authenticated Patreon account to the same local user.ID, instead of deriving a unique ID from the Patreon account returned by Patreon.

In practice, this means all Patreon-authenticated users of an application using this library are collapsed into a single local identity. Any application that trusts token.User.ID as the stable account key can end up mixing or fully merging unrelated Patreon users, which can lead to cross-account access, privilege confusion, and subscription-state leakage.

Details

The bug is in the Patreon provider's user-mapping logic.

Both the root module and the v2 module create a fresh empty token.User{} and then derive the Patreon ID from userInfo.ID before that field has been populated:

mapUser: func(data UserData, bdata []byte) token.User {
    userInfo := token.User{}

    uinfoJSON := uinfo{}
    if err := json.Unmarshal(bdata, &uinfoJSON); err == nil {
        userInfo.ID = "patreon_" + token.HashID(sha1.New(), userInfo.ID)
        userInfo.Name = uinfoJSON.Data.Attributes.FullName
        userInfo.Picture = uinfoJSON.Data.Attributes.ImageURL
        ...
    }
    return userInfo
}

Affected locations:

  • provider/providers.go:257
  • v2/provider/providers.go:257

At that point, userInfo.ID is still the empty string, so the effective result is always:

patreon_ + sha1("")

which is:

patreon_da39a3ee5e6b4b0d3255bfef95601890afd80709

for every Patreon user.

The code appears to have intended to hash the Patreon user ID returned by Patreon, i.e. uinfoJSON.Data.ID, but instead hashes the uninitialized destination field.

Why this matters:

  1. Patreon is a documented, supported provider.
  2. The library documents token.User.ID as the hashed user ID exposed to consumers.
  3. The OAuth flow stores the mapped user object in JWT claims, and middleware later injects that object into the request context verbatim, consuming handlers receive the provider's wrong user.ID as authoritative identity.

Relevant flow in v2:

  • v2/provider/oauth2.go:207 calls u := p.mapUser(...)
  • v2/provider/oauth2.go:223 stores u in token claims
  • v2/middleware/auth.go:154 copies *claims.User into request context

The existing tests already encode the broken behavior:

  • provider/providers_test.go:179
  • provider/providers_test.go:204
  • v2/provider/providers_test.go:179
  • v2/provider/providers_test.go:204

Those tests assert the constant empty-string hash value for Patreon users.

PoC

This can be reproduced locally without contacting Patreon by exercising the provider's mapUser logic with two different Patreon payloads.

From the repository root, create a temporary test file:

v2/provider/patreon_repro_test.go

package provider

import "testing"

func TestPatreonSharedIdentity(t *testing.T) {
    r := NewPatreon(Params{
        URL:     "http://example.com",
        Cid:     "cid",
        Csecret: "secret",
    })

    a := r.mapUser(UserData{}, []byte(`{
        "data": {
            "attributes": {
                "full_name": "Alice",
                "image_url": "https://example.com/alice.png"
            },
            "id": "1111111"
        }
    }`))

    b := r.mapUser(UserData{}, []byte(`{
        "data": {
            "attributes": {
                "full_name": "Bob",
                "image_url": "https://example.com/bob.png"
            },
            "id": "9999999"
        }
    }`))

    if a.ID != b.ID {
        t.Fatalf("expected IDs to collide, got %q and %q", a.ID, b.ID)
    }

    t.Logf("Alice -> %s", a.ID)
    t.Logf("Bob   -> %s", b.ID)
}

Then run:

cd v2
go test ./provider -run TestPatreonSharedIdentity -v

Expected result:

Alice -> patreon_da39a3ee5e6b4b0d3255bfef95601890afd80709
Bob   -> patreon_da39a3ee5e6b4b0d3255bfef95601890afd80709

I also confirmed this locally with three distinct Patreon data.id values; all of them produced the same patreon_da39... identity.

You can also see the same issue reflected in the existing built-in tests, which already assert this constant Patreon ID.

Impact

This is an authentication/identity-collision vulnerability in the Patreon provider.

Impacted users:

  • applications using github.com/go-pkgz/auth/provider.NewPatreon
  • applications using github.com/go-pkgz/auth/v2/provider.NewPatreon
  • applications that rely on token.User.ID as the stable local account identifier, or use it to key roles, profiles, entitlements, subscription state, or other authorization-relevant records

Practical impact:

  • all Patreon-authenticated users in the same application can collapse into the same local account
  • data associated with one Patreon user may be exposed to or overwritten by another Patreon user
  • Patreon-specific attributes such as is_paid_sub can leak across unrelated users
  • if a target application grants any elevated privileges to the local account keyed by this shared Patreon ID, those privileges can effectively apply to every Patreon login

Suggested Fix

The Patreon provider should derive the user ID from the Patreon account ID returned by Patreon, not from the uninitialized destination struct.

In both of these files:

  • provider/providers.go
  • v2/provider/providers.go

change:

userInfo.ID = "patreon_" + token.HashID(sha1.New(), userInfo.ID)

to:

userInfo.ID = "patreon_" + token.HashID(sha1.New(), uinfoJSON.Data.ID)

I would also recommend adding a regression test with at least two different Patreon data.id values and asserting that they produce different local IDs.

Because the current bug causes all Patreon users to share a single local ID, maintainers may also want to consider migration guidance for consumers who already have Patreon-linked local accounts created under the broken identifier.

References

@umputun umputun published to go-pkgz/auth Apr 22, 2026
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Apr 30, 2026
Reviewed Apr 30, 2026
Published by the National Vulnerability Database May 9, 2026
Last updated May 13, 2026

Severity

Critical

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
None

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N

EPSS score

Exploit Prediction Scoring System (EPSS)

This score estimates the probability of this vulnerability being exploited within the next 30 days. Data provided by FIRST.
(10th percentile)

Weaknesses

Improper Authentication

When an actor claims to have a given identity, the product does not prove or insufficiently proves that the claim is correct. Learn more on MITRE.

CVE ID

CVE-2026-42560

GHSA ID

GHSA-f6qq-3m3h-4g42

Source code

Credits

Loading Checking history
See something to contribute? Suggest improvements for this vulnerability.