Executive brief
Apache Airflow, a platform used to schedule and monitor workflows, is vulnerable to a security flaw that allows authorized workflow authors to execute malicious code on the central webserver. While these authors are typically trusted users, this vulnerability allows them to bypass intended security boundaries and potentially compromise the entire Airflow environment. Organizations should upgrade to version 3.2.0 to prevent unauthorized system access.
Technical details
A deserialization vulnerability (CWE-502) exists in Apache Airflow's handling of XCom payloads within the API extra-links component. The root cause is the use of full deserialization/class instantiation when processing XCom values for the "details" page of a task, rather than safe stringification. An attacker with DAG author privileges (High privileges) can craft a malicious XCom payload that, when processed by the webserver, triggers arbitrary code execution. The issue is resolved in Apache Airflow 3.2.0 by implementing safe string conversion for XCom values in the extra links API.
Affected products
- Apache apache-airflow-core < 3.2.0
Timeline
- 2026-02-09: patched: Fix merged into main branch via PR 61641
- 2026-04-17: disclosed: Mailing list announcement on oss-security
- 2026-04-18: advisory: GitHub Advisory and NVD entry published