Possible circumvention of file size limits in Active Storage direct uploads to Google Cloud Storage
Published: November 04, 2026
SECURITY IDENTIFIERS
- GHSA: GHSA-hfr4-8rjc-97m2
- Vendor Advisory: https://github.com/rails/rails/security/advisories/GHSA-hfr4-8rjc-97m2
GEM
FRAMEWORK
SEVERITY
CVSS v3.x: 5.3 (Medium)
PATCHED VERSIONS
~> 8.0.5, >= 8.0.5.2
>= 8.1.4.1
DESCRIPTION
Impact
ActiveStorage::Service::GCSService#url_for_direct_upload does not bind the
declared content length into the signed direct-upload URL, and
#headers_for_direct_upload returns no length constraint, so the URL
authorizes an upload body of any size. A direct-upload client could store a
file larger than the byte_size it declared, and the resulting blob keeps the
declared size, possibly bypassing application file size validations and
quotas. This is the weakness that CVE-2020-8162 fixed in the S3 service.
Applications that store files in Google Cloud Storage and accept direct uploads are affected.
Details
The fixed releases sign an x-goog-content-length-range header that matches
the blob's declared byte_size and return it from
headers_for_direct_upload, so Cloud Storage rejects an upload body of any
other size. Browsers send this header with the direct upload, so a bucket's
CORS configuration must list x-goog-content-length-range in
responseHeader, or browser direct uploads fail after the upgrade. The Active
Storage CHANGELOG and the CORS example in the Active Storage guide show the
change.
Releases
The fixed releases are available at the normal locations.
Patches for those who cannot upgrade at once:
- 8.1: https://github.com/rails/rails/commit/e19916cea31cbfb0030b165ae853b741f8dd57a7.patch
- 8.0: https://github.com/rails/rails/commit/7fe85a72a789eae5ee070ce3ee1dad10a8a5f70c.patch
Credit
This issue was responsibly reported by HackerOne researcher f4cts.
RELATED
- https://rubygems.org/gems/activestorage/versions/8.1.4.1
- https://github.com/rails/rails/releases/tag/v8.1.4.1
- https://rubygems.org/gems/activestorage/versions/8.0.5.2
- https://github.com/rails/rails/releases/tag/v8.0.5.2
- https://github.com/rails/rails/commit/e19916cea31cbfb0030b165ae853b741f8dd57a7
- https://github.com/rails/rails/commit/7fe85a72a789eae5ee070ce3ee1dad10a8a5f70c
- https://github.com/rails/rails/security/advisories/GHSA-hfr4-8rjc-97m2
