# CVE-2026-97685: LimeSurvey Community Edition authorization bypass in REST survey patching

Source: https://junglewise.ai/threats/cve-2026-97685-an-authenticated-limesurvey-community-edition-7-3-0-user-allowed  
Publisher: Junglewise Threat Intelligence, https://junglewise.ai/threats  
Published: 2026-09-29. Updated: 2026-09-29  
License: CC BY 4.0 with a link back

CVE-2026-97685 · Severity: info · Published 2026-09-29

LimeSurvey Community Edition is an open-source survey creation and management platform. An authenticated user with permission to create surveys can modify questions and answers in other users' surveys by exploiting an authorization flaw in the REST API. This could allow unauthorized changes to survey content belonging to other users.

Technologies: [LimeSurvey Community Edition](https://junglewise.ai/threats/technologies/limesurvey-community-edition). Vendors: [LimeSurvey](https://junglewise.ai/threats/vendors/limesurvey).

## Quick answers

**Is CVE-2026-97685 exploited in the wild?** No. Junglewise Threat Intelligence has no report of CVE-2026-97685 being exploited in the wild.

**How severe is CVE-2026-97685?** Informational severity, published 29 September 2026.

**Which products and versions are affected?** LimeSurvey Community Edition 7.3.0.

**Is there a fix for CVE-2026-97685?** No fixed version is recorded yet. Check the vendor's advisory in the references below. If you run it, Junglewise drafts a mitigation that fits your setup and applies it once you approve, with senior security engineers behind it.

**How is CVE-2026-97685 attacked?** It is attacked over the network, in a web application.

**Am I affected by CVE-2026-97685?** Check whether you run LimeSurvey Community Edition at an affected version. Junglewise does that check for you around the clock: connect your code, cloud and domains, and it matches new vulnerabilities like this one against what you actually run and tells you when one reaches you.

## Technical details

The vulnerability is a cross-object authorization bypass in the REST survey-patching endpoint. The endpoint validates that the attacker has permission for the survey ID in the request URL, but the underlying persistence operations resolve question (qid) and answer (aid) identifiers globally without verifying these objects belong to the authorized survey. An authenticated attacker with survey creation privileges can supply identifiers from another user's survey to modify their content.

## Affected products

- LimeSurvey Community Edition 7.3.0

## Timeline

- 2026-09-29: disclosed

## References

- [https://fluidattacks.com/es/advisories/zoo](https://fluidattacks.com/es/advisories/zoo)
- [https://github.com/LimeSurvey/LimeSurvey/](https://github.com/LimeSurvey/LimeSurvey/)

## Related threats

- [LimeSurvey Community Edition SQL injection in survey import/export](https://junglewise.ai/threats/cve-2026-116645-limesurvey-community-edition-7-8-0-contains-an-sql-injection)
- [LimeSurvey Community Edition stored XSS in participants database](https://junglewise.ai/threats/cve-2026-115640-limesurvey-community-edition-7-7-0-contains-a-stored-cross-site)
- [LimeSurvey Community Edition stored XSS in Date/Time question](https://junglewise.ai/threats/cve-2026-102626-an-authenticated-limesurvey-community-edition-7-4-0-user-with)
- [LimeSurvey Community Edition reflected XSS in CSV import](https://junglewise.ai/threats/cve-2026-92730-limesurvey-community-edition-7-0-14-contains-a-reflected-cross)
- [LimeSurvey stored XSS in survey import warnings](https://junglewise.ai/threats/cve-2026-91775-limesurvey-fails-to-safely-encode-attacker-controlled-content)