pgAdmin 4: SQL injection in COMMENT ON ... IS '<description>' rendering across dialog templates
Description
SQL injection in pgAdmin 4 across every dialog template that renders `COMMENT ON ... IS '' for a user-supplied description field. The Jinja templates for Domains (and their constraints), Foreign Tables, Languages, and Event Triggers, plus the Views OID-lookup query, interpolated the description directly inside a single-quoted SQL literal -- '{{ data.description }}' -- instead of passing it through the qtLiteral escape filter. An authenticated pgAdmin user with permission to create or alter the affected object types could submit a description containing an apostrophe, break out of the literal and chain arbitrary SQL. The injected SQL runs under the PostgreSQL role the user is already authenticated as; for a connected role with COPY ... TO/FROM PROGRAM` (typically PostgreSQL superuser), this chains to OS command execution on the PostgreSQL host. The defect does not cross a privilege boundary -- the user already has direct SQL access to that role through pgAdmin's Query Tool -- so the attacker gains no capability beyond what their database role already grants. The marginal impact captures bypass of any application-layer Query Tool gating an operator may have configured.
The defect was originally reported against the Domain Dialog `description field; a code-wide audit identified sixteen sites of the same pattern across the templates listed above. The same review also surfaced ten related sinks in the pgstattuple/pgstatindex stats templates -- pgstattuple('{{schema}}.{{table}}') and the matching pgstatindex shape -- where qtIdent escapes embedded double quotes inside the identifier but not apostrophes, so a user with CREATE privilege on a schema could plant a table or index named foo'bar` and a later stats viewer would render an unbalanced literal.
Fix is layered:
- Sites: replace every `
'{{ x.description }}'with{{ x.description|qtLiteral(conn) }}(no surrounding quotes -- the filter wraps the value in escaped quotes itself). Plumbconn=self.connthrough everyrender_templatecall that loads one of these templates. Also corrects a{ % elifJinja typo in the foreign-table schema diff (dead branch). Rewrite the ten pgstattuple/pgstatindex stats sites to address the relation via OID +::oid::regclasscast (e.g.pgstattuple({{ tid }}::oid::regclass)`), eliminating the embedded literal-call form entirely so that bug-class can no longer recur there.
- Driver hardening: `
qtLiteral(inutils/driver/psycopg3/__init__.py) used to silently return the raw unescaped value when itsconnargument was falsy. It now raisesValueError-- surfacing the entire bug class going forward. The change immediately uncovered eight latent plumbing bugs (inschemas/__init__.py,schemas/functions/__init__.py,schemas/tables/utils.py,foreign_servers/__init__.py, and seven sites inroles/__init__.py) -- all fixed as part of this patch. The innerexcept` block that swallowed adapter-level failures and returned the raw value is also removed, so unadaptable inputs raise instead of leaking unescaped values.
- Regression tests: a per-template behavioural test renders each previously-vulnerable template with an apostrophe-injection payload and asserts the escaped fragment is present and the vulnerable fragment absent; a lint test walks every `
*.sqltemplate flagging any'{{ ... }}'` single-quote-wrapped interpolation against an explicit allowlist; unit tests cover the new qtLiteral fail-fast and inner-except raise paths.
This issue affects pgAdmin 4: from 1.0 before 9.16.
AI Insight
LLM-synthesized narrative grounded in this CVE's description and references.
Affected products
2>= 1.0, < 9.16+ 1 more
- (no CPE)range: >= 1.0, < 9.16
- (no CPE)range: >=1.0, <9.16
Patches
Vulnerability mechanics
References
3- github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/commit/2ae0d3610mitrepatch
- github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/commit/658bb585dmitrepatch
- github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/10078mitreissue-tracking
News mentions
2- ⚡ Weekly Recap: Proxy Botnets, Browser Ransomware, AI Agent Tricks, Fake PoC Malware and MoreThe Hacker News · Jul 6, 2026
- pgAdmin 4 Released With Fixes for Seven Security Vulnerabilities and New FeaturesCyber Security News · Jun 22, 2026