CRE-2025-0178: n8n Webhook Silent Failure Detection #148
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closes #128
/claim #128
🎯 Overview
This PR introduces a comprehensive detection rule for n8n Webhook Silent Failures - addressing critical silent data loss where incoming webhook requests fail to trigger workflows without proper error reporting or alerting. This represents the most dangerous type of n8n failure where business-critical automations silently fail to process incoming data, leads, or API events, potentially going undetected for days or weeks.
CRE Playground Links
CRE-2025-0178 Playground: Test Rule
📊 n8n Issues Covered
500 Internal Server Error: Workflow could not be started! Webhook execution failed
500 Internal Server Error: Workflow could not be started! Database connection unavailable
Worker failed to find data for execution ID exec_789abc - execution context lost
504 Gateway Timeout: webhook request exceeded 30 second timeout limit
500 Internal Server Error: Workflow could not be started! Memory allocation failed
Connection refused: n8n service unavailable on port 5678
JavaScript heap out of memory during webhook processing
Webhook data permanently lost - no recovery possible
🧪 Testing & Validation
cat rules/cre-2025-0178/test.log | preq -r rules/cre-2025-0178/n8n-webhook-silent-failure.yaml -d
🎬 Demo Environment
Repo link: https://github.com/prequel-dev/cre/tree/main/examples/n8n-cre-demo
Screencast.from.2025-08-31.17-01-45.mp4
Features:
cd cre/examples/n8n-cre-demo ./start.sh
References