GHSA-3r75-xc34-5f44 Crawlee for Python: SSRF via sitemap-derived URLs
Overview**Vulnerability type:** Blind SSRF**Affected components:** `src/crawlee/_utils/sitemap.py`, `src/crawlee/_utils/robots.py`, `src/crawlee/request_loaders/_sitemap_request_loader.py`, and all built-in HTTP clients.**Trigger:** an attacker-controlled sitemap or `robots.txt` containing a URL that points to an internal host (layer 1) or uses a non-http scheme (layer 2).Two-layer SSRF via sitemap-derived URLs:1) Cross-host HTTP SSRFBase case, affects every HTTP client.** Sitemap entries and `robots.txt` `Sitemap:` directives were accepted regardless of the host they pointed to. A sitemap on `example.com` could push `http://internal.corp/admin` into the crawler's queue, and the configured HTTP client would dispatch the request.2) Non-HTTP scheme SSRFEscalation, only `CurlImpersonateHttpClient`.** Nested-sitemap fetching dispatches the URL straight to the HTTP client, bypassing the `Request` construction step where Pydantic enforces `http(s)`. Combined with the libcurl-backed `CurlImpersonateHttpClient`, this lets `gopher://`, `file://`, `dict://`, `ftp://`, etc., through.Root causeCrawlee already validates URL schemes through Pydantic's `AnyHttpUrl` (via `validate_http_url` in `src/crawlee/_utils/urls.py`) wherever a crawl target is materialised as a `Request`: the `Request.url` field is declared as `Annotated[str, BeforeValidator(validate_http_url), Field(frozen=True)]`. Anything that becomes a `Request` is therefore guaranteed to be `http(s)`.Two parts of the sitemap pipeline sidestepped this property in different ways:1) Sitemap-derived URLs were enqueued without any host policy`SitemapRequestLoader` took every `<urlset><url><loc>` entry, wrapped it in `Request.from_url` (which accepts any valid `http(s)` URL), and pushed the result into the request queue. `RobotsTxtFile.get_sitemaps()` returned every `Sitemap:` directive verbatim. Neither imposed any host check against the parent sitemap or `robots.txt` URL, so an attacker controlling that content could push internal-network HTTP URLs into the queue and have them crawled by whichever HTTP client was configured.2) Nested sitemap fetching bypassed the `Request` chokepoint entirelyWhen `_XmlSitemapParser` encountered `<sitemapindex><sitemap><loc>…</loc></sitemap></sitemapindex>`, or when `RobotsTxtFile.parse_sitemaps` forwarded `Sitemap:` directives into the same pipeline, `_fetch_and_process_sitemap` dispatched the URL directly to the HTTP client:No `Request` was constructed, so the Pydantic validator never ran. Before the fix, the HTTP clients' own `send_request()` and `stream()` methods did not call `validate_http_url` either, so a non-`http(s)` scheme could pass straight through to the backend client.The non-HTTP escalation in layer 2 is **specific to** `CurlImpersonateHttpClient`, which is backed by `curl-cffi` / libcurl and speaks `gopher`, `file`, `dict`, `ftp`, and other non-HTTP protocols. The other clients shipped with Crawlee (`HttpxHttpClient`, `ImpitHttpClient`, `PlaywrightHttpClient`) reject non-`http(s)` schemes at their own backend layer, regardless of what Crawlee passes in, so they were only affected by layer 1.Vulnerable pathsLayer 1 — cross-host HTTP (all HTTP clients)*Source:* an attacker-controlled sitemap that lists internal URLs under `<urlset><url><loc>` or `<sitemapindex><sitemap><loc>`, or an attacker-controlled `robots.txt` that lists internal URLs under `Sitemap:`.*Sink:* the configured HTTP client issues `GET` requests against those URLs — either via `client.request(url=request.url, …)` inside `crawl()` for regular sitemap URLs, or via `client.stream(url, …)` inside the nested-sitemap fetch.Layer 2 — non-HTTP schemes (`CurlImpersonateHttpClient` only)*Source:* a nested `<sitemap><loc>` entry or a `robots.txt` `Sitemap:` directive pointing to a non-`http(s)` URL.*Sink:* `CurlImpersonateHttpClient.stream(...)` hands the URL string verbatim to `client.request(url=…, …)`, which dispatches via libcurl.Hardening in 1.7.0 was added at both producer and consumer ends — see *Remediation*.Exploitation preconditionsThe crawler uses sitemap loading: any of `SitemapRequestLoader`, `Sitemap.load` / `parse_sitemap`, `discover_valid_sitemaps`, or `RobotsTxtFile.parse_sitemaps`.The attacker controls the body of a sitemap or `robots.txt` that the crawler fetches — typically by being the target site, or by getting a target site to publish a malicious sitemap.The crawler's network egress can reach the attacker-chosen destination (e.g., internal services on the same network).The targeted endpoint accepts unauthenticated requests. Crawlee does not supply credentials to the forged destination, so authenticated services (IMDSv2 with token, password-protected Redis, protected admin panels) are not reachable through this path.For layer 2 (non-HTTP), the configured HTTP client must additionally be `CurlImpersonateHttpClient`.ImpactLayer 1 — cross-host HTTP (any client)The crawler can be coerced into issuing `GET` requests against internal HTTP services on its own network: admin panels, unauthenticated internal APIs, cloud metadata endpoints, etc. Read-back is blind — Crawlee surfaces fetched content only through its local `Dataset` / `KeyValueStore` (`push_data()` etc.) and does not natively forward scraped bodies anywhere external — so direct impact is mostly existence/timing probing and occasional state changes via side-effecting `GET` endpoints. Read-side leakage of internal content is only exploitable end-to-end if the deployer's own application separately exposes scraped data (for example, a public summariser or aggregator built on top of Crawlee).Layer 2 — non-HTTP escalation (only `CurlImpersonateHttpClient`)Under the affected client, attackers gain the libcurl scheme set:`gopher://` is the canonical RESP-injection vector: pipeline `FLUSHALL`, `CONFIG SET dir`, `CONFIG SET dbfilename`, `SAVE` to an unauthenticated Redis on the crawler's network — enough to write attacker-controlled bytes to disk and, in the standard escalation, achieve remote code execution on the Redis host.`file://` allows the crawler to read local files (application secrets, configuration) on the crawler host.`dict://` and `ftp://` permit fingerprinting and limited interaction with text-protocol services.In both layers, the SSRF is blind in the default configuration. Write-side impact (`gopher://` → Redis) and timing-based internal probing do not depend on read-back and remain viable regardless of whether the deployer surfaces scraped content.RemediationBoth layers are fixed in `crawlee==1.7.0`. The fix is split across two PRs, applied at the two complementary boundaries of the affected pipeline:**Producer-side filtering — sitemap and robots.txt loaders (PR #1864).** `SitemapRequestLoader` and `RobotsTxtFile.get_sitemaps()` now run every nested-sitemap entry, every regular sitemap URL, and every `Sitemap:` directive through `crawlee._utils.urls.filter_url`. This applies to an `EnqueueStrategy` (default `'same-hostname'`) against the parent sitemap / `robots.txt` URL — cross-host entries are dropped — and rejects non-`http(s)` schemes. The strategy is stamped onto the emitted `Request`s, so `BasicCrawler._check_url_after_redirects` continues policing the policy across redirects.**Consumer-side validation — HTTP-client boundary (PR #1862).** `validate_http_url(url)` is now called at the top of `send_request()` and `stream()` in `ImpitHttpClient`, `HttpxHttpClient`, `CurlImpersonateHttpClient`, and `PlaywrightHttpClient`. Non-`http(s)` schemes raise `pydantic.ValidationError` before any backend call. `crawl()` was already covered, because `Request.url` is validated by Pydantic on construction.After these changes, validation is enforced both where sitemap-derived HTTP requests are produced (sitemap and robots.txt loaders) and where they are consumed (HTTP clients). A regression at either layer is caught by the other.Behaviour change for upgraders`SitemapRequestLoader` and `RobotsTxtFile.get_sitemaps()` now default to `enqueue_strategy='same-hostname'`. Deployers that legitimately relied on cross-host sitemap entries (e.g., a sitemap index on `sitemaps.example.com` that points to content on `www.example.com`) must opt in explicitly with `enqueue_strategy='same-domain'` or `enqueue_strategy='all'`.Finder credits[@r0otsu](https://github.com/r0otsu)[@Yuremin](https://github.com/Yuremin) (Zhengmin Yu)[@FORIMOC](https://github.com/FORIMOC)[@invoke1442](https://github.com/invoke1442) (Ethan Carter)[@Arturo0x90](https://github.com/Arturo0x90) (Arturo Melgarejo)
CVSS v4.0 score: 2.3