CVE-2019-16777 — npm
MEDIUMCVE-2019-16777 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) Path Traversal vulnerability in npm. A fix is available for npm — see the affected versions and patch details below.
npm Vulnerable to Global node_modules Binary Overwrite
EPSS Exploitation Probability
EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) is a daily probability model maintained by FIRST.org. It estimates the likelihood a CVE will be exploited in production environments within the next 30 days, derived from real-world threat intelligence signals.
How urgent is this, really
CVE-2019-16777 plotted by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). The shaded corner — EPSS 50%+ and CVSS 7.0+ — is where this CVE doesn't sit, though severity or exploitability alone can still warrant action.
Where this sits among everything scored
Of 377,166 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
How broadly this vulnerability is actually deployed: weekly install volume shows current usage, and reverse-dependency count shows how many other packages break if it stays unpatched.
npmnpmDescription
Versions of the npm CLI prior to 6.13.4 are vulnerable to an Arbitrary File Overwrite. It fails to prevent existing globally-installed binaries to be overwritten by other package installations. For example, if a package was installed globally and created a serve binary, any subsequent installs of packages that also create a serve binary would overwrite the previous serve binary. This behavior is still allowed in local installations and also through install scripts. This vulnerability bypasses a user using the --ignore-scripts install option.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | npm | all versions | 6.13.4npm install npm@6.13.4 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for npm, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update npm to 6.13.4 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2019-16777 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
If you can't upgrade right away: gate or disable the affected feature, validate untrusted input at the boundary, and avoid passing attacker-controlled data into the vulnerable path. O3's runtime protection blocks exploitation in production as an interim safeguard until the upgrade lands.
How O3 protects you
O3 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like CVE-2019-16777 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to CVE-2019-16777. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Fixing This On Your OS
If you run this on a Linux distribution, patch through your package manager against the distro's own security advisory below — it tracks the exact backported fix for your release, which can ship on a different timeline (and sometimes a different severity) than the upstream project.
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | nodejs:12-8010020200116150415.c27ad7f8 | RHEA-2020:0330 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | nodejs:10-8010020200213140254.c27ad7f8 | RHSA-2020:0579 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.0 Update Services for SAP Solutions | nodejs:10-8000020200214110450.f8e95b4e | RHSA-2020:0573 |
| Red Hat Software Collections for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | rh-nodejs10-nodejs-0:10.19.0-1.el7 | RHSA-2020:0597 |
| Red Hat Software Collections for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | rh-nodejs12-nodejs-0:12.16.1-1.el7 | RHSA-2020:0602 |
| Red Hat Software Collections for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | rh-nodejs8-nodejs-0:8.17.0-2.el7 | RHSA-2020:2625 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2019-16777 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds CVE-2019-16777 across npm dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.