Company
Date Published
Author
Karim Rahal
Word count
559
Language
-
Hacker News points
None

Summary

Karim Rahal, a 13-year-old independent web application security researcher from Lebanon, discovered a significant vulnerability in Spotify's web application that allowed anyone to create and publish playlists under any user or artist's name without their consent. The flaw was identified when Karim explored the restore feature for deleted playlists and manipulated the request to change the user directory, successfully publishing a playlist under a different account name. This critical vulnerability, which involved a cross-site request forgery and privilege escalation, was reported to Spotify, who acted promptly to resolve the issue within a week. Rahal's findings were subsequently published on the ethical security platform vulnerability-lab.com, highlighting the importance of prioritizing security over functionality and acknowledging the inevitability of human error in software development.