CVE-2013-4363 — rubygems-update
CVE-2013-4363 is a CWE-310 vulnerability in rubygems-update. A fix is available for rubygems-update — see the affected versions and patch details below.
RubyGems Regular Expression Denial of Service
EPSS Exploitation Probability
Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, from FIRST.org EPSS.
Real-World Exposure
rubygems-update💎rubygems-update💎rubygems-update💎rubygems-updateReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects RubyGems packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Algorithmic complexity vulnerability in Gem::Version::ANCHORED_VERSION_PATTERN in lib/rubygems/version.rb in RubyGems before 1.8.23.2, 1.8.24 through 1.8.26, 2.0.x before 2.0.10, and 2.1.x before 2.1.5, as used in Ruby 1.9.0 through 2.0.0p247, allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (CPU consumption) via a crafted gem version that triggers a large amount of backtracking in a regular expression. NOTE: this issue is due to an incomplete fix for CVE-2013-4287.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 💎RubyGems | rubygems-update | all versions | 1.8.23.2bundle update rubygems-update --conservative |
| 💎RubyGems | rubygems-update | ≥ 1.8.24&&< 1.8.27 | 1.8.27bundle update rubygems-update --conservative |
| 💎RubyGems | rubygems-update | ≥ 2.0.0&&< 2.0.10 | 2.0.10bundle update rubygems-update --conservative |
| 💎RubyGems | rubygems-update | ≥ 2.1.0&&< 2.1.5 | 2.1.5bundle update rubygems-update --conservative |
Affected Products
rubyruby-langrubygemsrubygemsDetection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for rubygems-update, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update rubygems-update to 1.8.23.2 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2013-4363 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
Cap what an attacker can consume: apply request size, rate and timeout limits in front of the affected component, and run it with memory and CPU limits so exhaustion degrades one worker rather than the whole service.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2013-4363 in your dependencies?
Find it across RubyGems, including transitive dependencies.