CVE-2025-70027: Sunbird SunbirdEd-portal SSRF Vulnerability

CVE-2025-70027 Overview

CVE-2025-70027 is a Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF) vulnerability in Sunbird-Ed SunbirdEd-portal version 1.13.4. The flaw is classified under CWE-918: Server-Side Request Forgery and allows unauthenticated remote attackers to coerce the application into making arbitrary outbound HTTP requests. Successful exploitation discloses sensitive information accessible from the server's network position, including internal services and cloud metadata endpoints.

The vulnerability affects confidentiality only, with no impact to integrity or availability. SunbirdEd-portal is the front-end component of the Sunbird-Ed open-source learning platform widely deployed in educational ecosystems.

Critical Impact
Unauthenticated attackers can abuse the SunbirdEd-portal to issue server-originated HTTP requests, exposing internal services and sensitive metadata.

Affected Products

Sunbird-Ed SunbirdEd-portal v1.13.4
Deployments using the sunbird:sunbirded-portal component
Downstream distributions packaging the affected portal release

Discovery Timeline

2026-03-11 - CVE-2025-70027 published to the National Vulnerability Database
2026-04-02 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2025-70027

Vulnerability Analysis

The SunbirdEd-portal contains a request-handling path that accepts a user-controlled URL or host parameter and forwards an HTTP request without validating the destination. An attacker submits a crafted request that instructs the server to fetch an arbitrary URL. The server returns the upstream response, header data, or behavioral signals back to the attacker.

Because the request originates from the application server, it bypasses network controls that normally protect internal resources. Common SSRF targets include cloud instance metadata services (for example 169.254.169.254), internal administrative consoles, databases bound to loopback interfaces, and service discovery endpoints. The vulnerability is reachable over the network with low attack complexity and requires no authentication or user interaction.

Root Cause

The root cause is missing or insufficient validation of destination URLs supplied to a server-side fetch routine. The portal does not enforce an allowlist of permitted hosts, does not block private and link-local IP ranges, and does not constrain URL schemes. Refer to the SunbirdEd-portal source repository for the affected codebase.

Attack Vector

Exploitation requires only network access to the SunbirdEd-portal HTTP interface. An attacker submits a request containing a URL pointing to an internal or sensitive endpoint. The server performs the request and returns information derived from the response. A proof-of-concept is documented in the public PoC gist.

No verified exploitation code is reproduced here. See the linked references for technical reproduction details.

Detection Methods for CVE-2025-70027

Indicators of Compromise

Outbound HTTP requests from the SunbirdEd-portal server to private IP ranges such as 10.0.0.0/8, 172.16.0.0/12, and 192.168.0.0/16
Server-originated requests to cloud metadata endpoints, especially http://169.254.169.254/
Unusual user-supplied URL parameters in portal request logs pointing to internal hostnames or loopback addresses
Spikes in egress traffic from the portal application tier to non-business destinations

Detection Strategies

Inspect web access logs for request parameters containing fully qualified URLs, IP literals, or schemes such as file://, gopher://, and dict://
Correlate inbound portal requests with subsequent outbound connections from the application host using flow telemetry
Alert on any process on the portal server initiating connections to link-local or RFC 1918 addresses

Monitoring Recommendations

Forward portal application logs and host network telemetry to a centralized analytics platform for correlation
Enable egress traffic logging at the cloud or perimeter level to capture all outbound requests from the SunbirdEd-portal host
Monitor cloud instance metadata service access logs where supported by the cloud provider

How to Mitigate CVE-2025-70027

Immediate Actions Required

Restrict outbound network access from SunbirdEd-portal hosts to only required destinations using host or cloud firewall rules
Block portal server access to instance metadata endpoints, or enforce IMDSv2 with session tokens on AWS deployments
Place the portal behind a web application firewall configured to inspect and filter URL parameters for SSRF patterns

Patch Information

No vendor patch advisory is referenced in the NVD entry at the time of publication. Monitor the Sunbird-Ed project and the SunbirdEd-portal repository for security updates beyond version 1.13.4.

Workarounds

Implement an allowlist of permitted external hosts at the application proxy layer
Deny resolution of internal and link-local hostnames at the DNS resolver used by the portal
Drop outbound traffic from the portal to 169.254.169.254, loopback addresses, and RFC 1918 ranges except where strictly required
Strip or validate user-supplied URL fields at an upstream reverse proxy before requests reach the portal

bash

# Example iptables egress restriction for the SunbirdEd-portal host
iptables -A OUTPUT -d 169.254.169.254 -j DROP
iptables -A OUTPUT -d 10.0.0.0/8 -j DROP
iptables -A OUTPUT -d 172.16.0.0/12 -j DROP
iptables -A OUTPUT -d 192.168.0.0/16 -j DROP
iptables -A OUTPUT -d 127.0.0.0/8 -j DROP