CVE-2026-53709

MCP Context Forge: Hardcoded default JWT_SECRET_KEY shipped in source and .env.example enables pre-authentication platform admin token forgery

State: Published
Severity: 9.8 Critical
Published: Oct 13, 2026
Updated: Oct 16, 2026
Reserved: Jun 10, 2026

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Description

MCP Context Forge is an MCP gateway and administrative platform. Prior to 1.0.2, mcpgateway/config.py and .env.example ship a known JWT_SECRET_KEY, while verify_jwt_token() accepts HS256 tokens signed with that key and get_current_user() creates a platform administrator when the token subject matches PLATFORM_ADMIN_EMAIL and REQUIRE_USER_IN_DB is false. A remote unauthenticated attacker can therefore mint accepted administrator tokens without a database account. While the vulnerable signing key remains configured and the platform-admin bootstrap remains enabled, forged access survives password rotation, account deletion, and session revocation, allowing administrative disclosure, modification, and service disruption. This issue is fixed in version 1.0.2.

Scores

CVSS	Score	Vector	Source
3.1	9.8 Critical	CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H	GitHub_M

Weaknesses

CWE-287 Improper Authentication
CWE-321 Use of Hard-coded Cryptographic Key
CWE-798 Use of Hard-coded Credentials
CWE-1188 Insecure Default Initialization of Resource

Affected Products

Product	Versions
mcp-context-forgeIBM	< 1.0.2Affected

References

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