CVE-2021-3281 is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.3) Path Traversal vulnerability in django. A fix is available for django — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Django Directory Traversal via archive.extract
EPSS Exploitation Probability
Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, from FIRST.org EPSS.
How urgent is this, really
CVE-2021-3281 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
django🐍django🐍djangoReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects PyPI packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
In Django 2.2 before 2.2.18, 3.0 before 3.0.12, and 3.1 before 3.1.6, the django.utils.archive.extract method (used by "startapp --template" and "startproject --template") allows directory traversal via an archive with absolute paths or relative paths with dot segments.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐍PyPI | django | ≥ 2.2&&< 2.2.18 | 2.2.18pip install --upgrade 'django==2.2.18' |
| 🐍PyPI | django | ≥ 3.1&&< 3.1.6 | 3.1.6pip install --upgrade 'django==3.1.6' |
| 🐍PyPI | django | ≥ 3.0&&< 3.0.12 | 3.0.12pip install --upgrade 'django==3.0.12' |
Affected Products
djangodjangoprojectfedorafedoraprojectsnapcenternetappDetection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for django, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update django to 2.2.18 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2021-3281 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
Resolve every user-supplied path to its canonical form and reject anything that escapes the intended directory, and run the component under an account that has no read or write access outside the directory it legitimately serves.
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.
The following products ship affected version of python-django, however the vulnerable function archive.extract() is currently not used in any part of the product and hence this issue has been rated as having a security impact of Low: * Red Hat Gluster Storage 3 * Red Hat Update Infrastructure 3 Because the flaw's…
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Ansible Tower 3.8 for RHEL 7 | ansible-tower-38/ansible-runner-rhel7:1.4.7-1 | RHSA-2021:0780 |
| Red Hat Automation Hub 4.2 for RHEL 7 | automation-hub-0:4.2.2-1.el7pc | RHSA-2021:0781 |
| Red Hat OpenStack Platform 16.1 | python-django20-0:2.0.13-16.el8ost.1 | RHSA-2021:5070 |
| Red Hat OpenStack Platform 16.2 | python-django20-0:2.0.13-16.el8ost.1 | RHSA-2021:3490 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2021-3281 in your dependencies?
Find it across PyPI, including transitive dependencies.