Description

IBM ContextForge MCP Gateway <= v1.0.7 MCP Context Forge could allow a remote authenticated attacker to obtain sensitive credentials and escalate privileges due to improper validation of jq filters.

Executive Summary

Technical Details

Mitigations

References

Additional Metadata

{
  "score": "8.8",
  "pubDate": "2026-09-04T17:16:56.420Z",
  "pubdate": "2026-09-04T17:16:56.420Z",
  "executiveSummary": "The IBM ContextForge MCP Gateway, specifically versions up to and including v1.0.7, contains a critical security vulnerability related to improper input validation within its jq filter processing mechanism. This flaw allows a remote, authenticated attacker to manipulate jq filters to execute unauthorized operations.\nThe primary risk associated with this vulnerability is the potential for sensitive credential exposure and unauthorized privilege escalation. By injecting malicious jq expressions, an attacker can bypass intended data access controls, potentially extracting internal system credentials, configuration secrets, or administrative tokens stored within the MCP context.\nThe vulnerability requires the attacker to be authenticated to the target instance, but it does not necessitate additional high-level administrative privileges prior to exploitation. Successful exploitation grants the attacker the ability to interact with the application backend in ways unintended by the developers, potentially leading to a full compromise of the affected MCP Gateway instance.\nOrganizations relying on IBM ContextForge must prioritize addressing this issue, as it directly impacts the confidentiality and integrity of the application's authentication and authorization architecture.",
  "technicalDetails": "The vulnerability resides within the IBM ContextForge MCP Gateway component responsible for parsing and executing jq filters. jq is a lightweight and flexible command-line JSON processor; however, when used within an application as a filter execution engine without strict sanitization, it becomes a vector for injection attacks. The root cause is the lack of proper validation or sandboxing of user-supplied jq filter strings, which allows the filter logic to escape its intended scope.\nThe attack flow begins with an authenticated attacker submitting a crafted request containing a malicious jq expression. Because the underlying processing engine evaluates this expression against the application's JSON context data, an attacker can construct a filter that traverses the data structure to access sensitive keys, environment variables, or private objects that are not meant to be exposed through the standard API response.\nUpon processing the malformed jq filter, the application's parsing engine executes the injected logic. If the environment shares memory or persistent context data where credentials are stored, the attacker can leverage functions such as 'map', 'select', or variable assignment to leak these secrets into the application response. This leads to information disclosure of sensitive credentials.\nFurthermore, the ability to manipulate the data context through malicious jq execution can be leveraged to escalate privileges. If the application relies on the results of the jq processing to determine user roles or permission sets, an attacker may be able to alter the resulting JSON output to inject higher-level authorization claims into the session processing logic. By successfully mutating these internal objects, the attacker effectively elevates their privileges within the context of the MCP Gateway, allowing them to perform actions restricted to administrative users.\nThe exploitation is primarily limited to authenticated users, meaning the exposure is constrained to entities already capable of establishing a session with the MCP Gateway. However, given the nature of the injection, an attacker with minimal non-privileged access could potentially escalate to administrative control, making this a high-severity flaw within the internal application architecture.\nNo additional network exposure beyond the standard authentication interface is required, as the payload is delivered via the application's standard communication protocols."
}