Changelog

We have upgraded WAF Payload Logging to enhance rule diagnostics and usability:

• Targeted logging: Logs now capture only the specific portions of requests that triggered WAF rules, rather than entire request segments.
• Visual highlighting: Matched content is visually highlighted in the UI for faster identification.
• Enhanced context: Logs now include surrounding context to make diagnostics more effective.

Payload Logging is available to all Enterprise customers. If you have not used Payload Logging before, check how you can get started.

Note: The structure of the encrypted_matched_data field in Logpush has changed from Map<Field, Value> to Map<Field, {Before: bytes, Content: Value, After: bytes}>. If you rely on this field in your Logpush jobs, you should review and update your processing logic accordingly.

This week's analysis covers five CVEs with varying impact levels. Four are rated critical, while one is rated high severity. Remote Code Execution vulnerabilities dominate this set.

Key Findings

GFI KerioControl (CVE-2024-52875) contains an unauthenticated Remote Code Execution (RCE) vulnerability that targets firewall appliances. This vulnerability can let attackers gain root level system access, making this CVE particularly attractive for threat actors.

The SonicWall SMA vulnerabilities remain concerning due to their continued exploitation since 2021. These critical vulnerabilities in remote access solutions create dangerous entry points to networks.

Impact

Customers using the Managed Ruleset will receive rule coverage following this week's release. Below is a breakdown of the recommended prioritization based on current exploitation trends:

• GFI KerioControl (CVE-2024-52875) - Highest priority; unauthenticated RCE
• SonicWall SMA (Multiple vulnerabilities) - Critical for network appliances
• XWiki (CVE-2025-24893) - High priority for development environments
• Langflow (CVE-2025-3248) - Important for AI workflow platforms
• MinIO (CVE-2025-31489) - Important for object storage implementations

Each of this week's rule releases covers a distinct CVE, with half of the rules targeting Remote Code Execution (RCE) attacks. Of the 6 CVEs covered, four were scored as critical, with the other two scored as high.

When deciding which exploits to tackle, Cloudflare tunes into the attackers' areas of focus. Cloudflare's network intelligence provides a unique lens into attacker activity – for instance, through the volume of blocked requests related with CVE exploits after updating WAF Managed Rules with new detections.

From this week's releases, one indicator that RCE is a "hot topic" attack type is the fact that the Oracle PeopleSoft RCE rule accounts for half of all of the new rule matches. This rule patches CVE-2023-22047, a high-severity vulnerability in the Oracle PeopleSoft suite that allows unauthenticated attackers to access PeopleSoft Enterprise PeopleTools data through remote code execution. This is particularly concerning because of the nature of the data managed by PeopleSoft – this can include payroll records or student profile information. This CVE, along with five others, are addressed with the latest detection update to WAF Managed Rules.

Update: Mon Mar 24th, 11PM UTC: Next.js has made further changes to address a smaller vulnerability introduced in the patches made to its middleware handling. Users should upgrade to Next.js versions 15.2.4, 14.2.26, 13.5.10 or 12.3.6. If you are unable to immediately upgrade or are running an older version of Next.js, you can enable the WAF rule described in this changelog as a mitigation.

Update: Mon Mar 24th, 8PM UTC: Next.js has now backported the patch for this vulnerability ↗︎ to cover Next.js v12 and v13. Users on those versions will need to patch to 13.5.9 and 12.3.5 (respectively) to mitigate the vulnerability.

Update: Sat Mar 22nd, 4PM UTC: We have changed this WAF rule to opt-in only, as sites that use auth middleware with third-party auth vendors were observing failing requests.

We strongly recommend updating your version of Next.js (if eligible) to the patched versions, as your app will otherwise be vulnerable to an authentication bypass attack regardless of auth provider.

This rule is opt-in only for sites on the Pro plan or above in the WAF managed ruleset.

To enable the rule:

1. Head to Security > WAF > Managed rules in the Cloudflare dashboard for the zone (website) you want to protect.
2. Click the three dots next to Cloudflare Managed Ruleset and choose Edit
3. Scroll down and choose Browse Rules
4. Search for CVE-2025-29927 (ruleId: 34583778093748cc83ff7b38f472013e)
5. Change the Status to Enabled and the Action to Block. You can optionally set the rule to Log, to validate potential impact before enabling it. Log will not block requests.
6. Click Next
7. Scroll down and choose Save

This will enable the WAF rule and block requests with the x-middleware-subrequest header regardless of Next.js version.

For users on the Free plan, or who want to define a more specific rule, you can create a Custom WAF rule to block requests with the x-middleware-subrequest header regardless of Next.js version.

To create a custom rule:

1. Head to Security > WAF > Custom rules in the Cloudflare dashboard for the zone (website) you want to protect.
2. Give the rule a name - e.g. next-js-CVE-2025-29927
3. Set the matching parameters for the rule match any request where the x-middleware-subrequest header exists per the rule expression below.

(len(http.request.headers["x-middleware-subrequest"]) > 0)

4. Set the action to 'block'. If you want to observe the impact before blocking requests, set the action to 'log' (and edit the rule later).
5. Deploy the rule.

We've made a WAF (Web Application Firewall) rule available to all sites on Cloudflare to protect against the Next.js authentication bypass vulnerability ↗︎ (CVE-2025-29927) published on March 21st, 2025.

Note: This rule is not enabled by default as it blocked requests across sites for specific authentication middleware.

• This managed rule protects sites using Next.js on Workers and Pages, as well as sites using Cloudflare to protect Next.js applications hosted elsewhere.
• This rule has been made available (but not enabled by default) to all sites as part of our WAF Managed Ruleset and blocks requests that attempt to bypass authentication in Next.js applications.
• The vulnerability affects almost all Next.js versions, and has been fully patched in Next.js 14.2.26 and 15.2.4. Earlier, interim releases did not fully patch this vulnerability.
• Users on older versions of Next.js (11.1.4 to 13.5.6) did not originally have a patch available, but this the patch for this vulnerability and a subsequent additional patch have been backported to Next.js versions 12.3.6 and 13.5.10 as of Monday, March 24th. Users on Next.js v11 will need to deploy the stated workaround or enable the WAF rule.

The managed WAF rule mitigates this by blocking external user requests with the x-middleware-subrequest header regardless of Next.js version, but we recommend users using Next.js 14 and 15 upgrade to the patched versions of Next.js as an additional mitigation.

Added new records to the leaked credentials database. The record sources are: Have I Been Pwned (HIBP) database, RockYou 2024 dataset, and another third-party database.

Added new records to the leaked credentials database from a third-party database.