PraisonAI Platform versions prior to 0.1.4 use a hard‑coded JWT signing secret of "dev‑secret‑change‑me" whenever the environment variable PLATFORM_JWT_SECRET is not set. A safety check that would normally trigger when the signing key is the default only executes if PLATFORM_ENV is not equal to "dev", but the default value for that variable is "dev", meaning the check is bypassed silently in any deployment that does not explicitly change the environment. An attacker who can read the source file or repository can therefore construct a valid JWT with arbitrary "sub" and "email" claims, authenticating as any user, including workspace owners and administrators. This flaw represents a critical authentication bypass caused by improper key management (CWE-321, CWE-798).

The affected software is the PraisonAI Platform developed by MervinPraison. Versions earlier than 0.1.4 of the platform include the default hard‑coded JWT signing key. The vulnerability is present when the deployment does not specify the PLATFORM_JWT_SECRET or explicitly sets PLATFORM_ENV to "dev". The issue was addressed in version 0.1.4, which replaces the default key with proper configuration enforcement.

The severity is critical, with a CVSS score of 9.8, and the EPSS score is below 1%, indicating that widespread exploitation has not yet been observed. Because the flaw is tied to a hard‑coded default key that is easy to discover in the source repository, an attacker can exploit it in any deployment that fails to override the defaults. The vulnerability does not depend on elevated privileges, so any adversary with access to the application code or the ability to read the repo can forge tokens. The issue is not currently listed in CISA’s KEV catalog, but its high CVSS and widespread code availability make it a priority for remediation.