CVE-2020-7767 — express-validators
MEDIUMCVE-2020-7767 is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.3) Uncontrolled Resource Consumption vulnerability in express-validators. 1 public exploit reference exists, so weaponization risk is real. No vendor fix is recorded yet; mitigation options are listed below.
Regular expression deinal of service in express-validators
EPSS Exploitation Probability
Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, from FIRST.org EPSS.
How urgent is this, really
CVE-2020-7767 by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). Outside the shaded patch-first corner.
Where this sits among everything scored
Of 385,738 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Counts from FIRST.org, log-scaled.
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.
express-validatorsnpmDescription
All versions of package express-validators are vulnerable to Regular Expression Denial of Service (ReDoS) when validating specifically-crafted invalid urls.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | express-validators | all versions | No fix |
Affected Products
express-validatorsexpress-validators_projectResearch 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 express-validators, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Remediation status
No patched version of express-validators has shipped for CVE-2020-7767 yet. Where your build allows, override or pin the dependency away from the vulnerable range, and apply any maintainer-recommended mitigation.
Mitigate without a patch
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-2020-7767 in your dependencies?
Find it across npm, including transitive dependencies.