GitHub Advisoryadvisory · Go
GHSA-m7cr-m3pv-hgrp go-git: Improper single-quote escaping in go-git SSH transport
LOW
Official page ↗
- Aliases
- CVE-2026-45570
- Ecosystem
- Go
- Packages
- github.com/go-git/go-git/v5, github.com/go-git/go-git/v6, github.com/go-git/go-git
- Severity
- Low
- CVSS vector
- CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:P/VC:N/VI:N/VA:N/SC:L/SI:L/SA:L
- Weaknesses
- CWE-116
- Reviewed
- 2026-05-19
Affected packages
• Go github.com/go-git/go-git/v5: < 5.19.1 → fixed in 5.19.1
• Go github.com/go-git/go-git/v6: < 6.0.0-alpha.4 → fixed in 6.0.0-alpha.4
• Go github.com/go-git/go-git: <= 4.7.0 (no fix yet)
Description
Impact
`go-git`'s SSH transport constructs the remote exec command by wrapping the repository path in single quotes without escaping single quotes embedded inside the path. This diverges from canonical Git, which shell-quotes the path through `sq_quote_buf` so that an embedded `'` becomes the `'\''` close-escape-reopen sequence and the whole path round-trips as a single quoted argument.
A repository path containing a single quote can therefore break out of the quoted region in the exec command and be appended as additional shell tokens. On SSH servers that evaluate the exec command through a shell (for example a user account whose login shell is `/bin/sh` or `/bin/bash`, or a `ForceCommand` wrapper that re-evaluates `$SSH_ORIGINAL_COMMAND`), those additional tokens execute in that account's command-execution context. SSH servers that tokenize the exec command without shell evaluation, including the canonical `git-shell` setup, are not affected.
The vulnerable behaviour is on the SSH server side, not in `go-git`: the same bytes can be produced by any SSH client. The change in `go-git` is defense-in-depth that restores parity with canonical Git's wire format and prevents `go-git` from being a vehicle for reaching shell-evaluating servers through attacker-influenced repository paths.
Patches
Users should upgrade to a patched version in order to mitigate this issue. The fix ports `sq_quote_buf` from canonical Git into `go-git`'s SSH transport so that the wire output is byte-identical to what `git` itself would send for the same input.
Versions prior to `v5` are likely to be affected, users are recommended to upgrade to a supported go-git version.
Credit
Thanks to @N0zoM1z0 for reporting this to the `go-git` project. :bow:
Related
Alias · CVE (1)
- CVE-2026-45570 go-git is an extensible git implementation library written in pure Go. vulnerability
Weakness · CWE (1)
- CWE-116 Improper Encoding or Escaping of Output weakness