In some Notification types (e.g., Webhook, Telegram), the send() function allows user-controlled renderTemplate input. This leads to a Server-side Template Injection (SSTI) vulnerability that can be exploited to read arbitrary files from the server.
The root cause is how Uptime Kuma renders user-controlled templates via renderTemplate(). The function instantiates a Liquid template engine and parses the template argument without sanitization:
async renderTemplate(template, msg, monitorJSON, heartbeatJSON) {
const engine = new Liquid();
const parsedTpl = engine.parse(template);
// ...
}
In some Notification flows, the send() implementation passes user-editable fields directly into renderTemplate():
// webhook.js
if (notification.webhookContentType === "form-data") {
const formData = new FormData();
formData.append("data", JSON.stringify(data));
config.headers = formData.getHeaders();
data = formData;
} else if (notification.webhookContentType === "custom") {
data = await this.renderTemplate(notification.webhookCustomBody, msg, monitorJSON, heartbeatJSON); //<- this line cause SSTI
}
Because notification can be edited by users and is rendered by the Liquid engine without proper sandboxing or a whitelist of allowed operations, an attacker can supply a crafted template that causes the server to read arbitrary files. In particular, Liquid’s template tags (e.g. {% render ... %}) can be abused to include server-side files if the engine is not restricted, resulting in Server-side Template Injection (SSTI) that leaks sensitive file contents.
{
"Title": {% render '/etc/passwd' %}
}
This is a post-authentication Server-side Template Injection (SSTI) vulnerability that allows an authenticated user to perform arbitrary file read on the server.
{
"cwe_ids": [
"CWE-1336",
"CWE-36"
],
"github_reviewed": true,
"github_reviewed_at": "2025-10-20T20:03:15Z",
"nvd_published_at": null,
"severity": "MODERATE"
}