CVE-2020-28469 is a high-severity (CVSS 7.5) Uncontrolled Resource Consumption vulnerability in glob-parent. 3 public exploit references exist, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for glob-parent — see the affected versions and patch details below.
glob-parent vulnerable to Regular Expression Denial of Service in enclosure regex
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-2020-28469 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 377,333 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.
glob-parentnpmDescription
This affects the package glob-parent before 5.1.2. The enclosure regex used to check for strings ending in enclosure containing path separator.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | glob-parent | ≥ 4.0.0&&< 5.1.2 | 5.1.2npm install glob-parent@5.1.2 |
Research use only. For defensive security, authorized penetration testing, and academic research only. Never execute exploit code against systems without explicit written authorization.
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for glob-parent, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update glob-parent to 5.1.2 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2020-28469 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-2020-28469 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to CVE-2020-28469. 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.
While some components do package a vulnerable version of glob-parent, access to them requires OpenShift OAuth credentials and hence have been marked with a Low impact. This applies to the following products: - OpenShift Container Platform (OCP) - OpenShift ServiceMesh (OSSM) - Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for…
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | nodejs:16-8050020211206113934.c5368500 | RHSA-2021:5171 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | nodejs:14-8050020211213115342.c5368500 | RHSA-2022:0350 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.4 Extended Update Support | nodejs:14-8040020211213111158.522a0ee4 | RHSA-2022:0246 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 | nodejs-nodemon-0:2.0.19-1.el9_0 | RHSA-2022:6595 |
| Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4.8 | openshift4/ose-console:v4.8.0-202107010336.p0.git.188a490.assembly.stream | RHSA-2021:2438 |
| Red Hat Software Collections for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | rh-nodejs14-nodejs-nodemon-0:2.0.3-5.el7 | RHSA-2021:3280 |
| Red Hat Software Collections for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | rh-nodejs12-nodejs-0:12.22.5-1.el7 | RHSA-2021:3281 |
| Red Hat Virtualization Engine 4.4 | ovirt-engine-ui-extensions-0:1.2.7-1.el8ev | RHSA-2021:2865 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2020-28469 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds CVE-2020-28469 across npm dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.