vulnerability / NVI-00017629 / Revision 1
SurrealDB: Field-level SELECT permissions bypassed via indexed COUNT fast paths
GitHub lists this reviewed advisory for surrealdb. Published version ranges and source prerequisites are shown below; this is not an inspection of a visitor’s application.
This report has not inspected your inventory, configuration, deployed build, reachability or evidence. A catalog listing and a severity score do not establish exposure or compromise.
01 / Meaning
Why it matters
Published affected context helps an owner decide what evidence to gather. This report has not examined your application.
4.3 medium
GitHub source severity; exploitability and local consequence require separate evidence.
As of · GitHub Advisory Database
02 / Applicability
The affected context
Affected versions, configuration prerequisites and known exclusions are public. Confirm each one against the deployed service.
surrealdb
source listed< 3.1.0
A record user could learn the value of a hidden field by counting how many records match a guess. When `DEFINE FIELD ... PERMISSIONS FOR select WHERE ...` hides a field's contents from a caller, and that field is indexed, running `SELECT count() FROM t WHERE hidden_field = "guess" GROUP ALL` returned a count greater than zero whenever a record actually had that value — even though the caller was never allowed to read the field directly. The query planner used an indexed-COUNT shortcut (`Index::Count`, `IndexCountScan`, or the legacy `Iterate Index Count` / `Iterate Index Keys` paths) that counts matching index entries and skips the permission check that would normally hide the value. The same query with `WITH NOINDEX` correctly returned `[]`, confirming the gap. By repeating the count query with different guesses, an attacker can confirm or recover the contents of any restricted field they could not read through a normal `SELECT`. ### Impact What an attacker **can** do: - Confirm or recover values of a field protected by field-level SELECT permissions on any table they hold table-level SELECT on, provided the field is indexed. - Repeat the query with different guesses to read
03 / Response
What to do next
- investigate
Identify the exact component and deployed version, examine the linked publisher’s conditions, and retain evidence of any mitigation.
Confirm current vendor support, compatibility and deployment evidence. This report has not tested a fix in your system. GitHub Advisory Database
A fixed release is not deployment evidence.
Check current vendor support and compatibility. After making a change, verify the deployed build and relevant runtime conditions. Keep the evidence, owner and time. An updated lockfile alone does not prove what is running.
04 / Limits
What this report cannot establish
- Customer inventory, deployment, reachability and exploitation have not been inspected.
05 / Provenance
Sources you can inspect
Each assertion retains its source. Mirrored records may repeat one underlying publisher; additional links are not independent corroboration.
- GHSA-c8jx-96c9-8xrp ↗
GitHub Advisory Database · vendor advisory
Observed . GitHub Advisory Database; CC-BY-4.0. Each advisory links its original attribution. Null normalizes fields.
Public revision history
Only published revisions appear here. Routine fetches do not create a material-change event.
- Revision 1 ·
First indexed by Null; source disclosure date is shown separately.