Gogs: Access tokens get exposed through URL params in API requests

Summary

The Gogs API still accepts tokens in URL parameters such as token and access_token, which can leak through logs, browser history, and referrers.

Details

A static review shows that the API still checks tokens in the URL query before looking at headers:

• internal/context/auth.go reads c.Query("token")
• internal/context/auth.go falls back to c.Query("access_token")
• internal/context/auth.go only checks the Authorization header when the query token is empty
• internal/context/auth.go authenticates using that token and marks the request as token-authenticated

Token-authenticated requests are accepted by API routes through c.IsTokenAuth checks:

• internal/route/api/v1/api.go

Impact

If tokens are sent in URLs such as /api/v1/user?token=..., they can leak in logs, browser or shell history, and referrer headers, and can be reused until revoked.

Recommended Fix

• Authentication headers should be used exclusively for token transmission.
• Token parameters should be blocked at the proxy or WAF level.
• Query strings should be scrubbed from logs.
• A strict referrer policy should be set.

Remediation

A fix is available at https://github.com/gogs/gogs/releases/tag/v0.14.2.