CVE-2022-23495 is a high-severity (CVSS 7.5) CWE-755 vulnerability in github.com/ipfs/go-merkledag. O3 Security confirms whether CVE-2022-23495 is actually reachable in your code before you act, and blocks exploitation at runtime until you patch.
ProtoNode may be modified such that common method calls may panic in ipfs/go-merkledag
Real-World Exposure
github.com/ipfs/go-merkledagReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Go packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
go-merkledag implements the 'DAGService' interface and adds two ipld node types, Protobuf and Raw for the ipfs project. A ProtoNode may be modified in such a way as to cause various encode errors which will trigger a panic on common method calls that don't allow for error returns. A ProtoNode should only be able to encode to valid DAG-PB, attempting to encode invalid DAG-PB forms will result in an error from the codec. Manipulation of an existing (newly created or decoded) ProtoNode using the modifier methods did not account for certain states that would place the ProtoNode into an unencodeable form. Due to conformance with the github.com/ipfs/go-block-format#Block and github.com/ipfs/go-ipld-format#Node interfaces, certain methods, which internally require a re-encode if state has changed, will panic due to the inability to return an error. This issue has been addressed across a number of pull requests. Users are advised to upgrade to version 0.8.1 for a complete set of fixes. Users unable to upgrade may attempt to mitigate this issue by sanitising inputs when allowing user-input to set a new CidBuilder on a ProtoNode and by sanitising Tsize (Link#Size) values such that they are a reasonable byte-size for sub-DAGs where derived from user-input.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐹Go | github.com/ipfs/go-merkledag | ≥ 0.4.0&&< 0.8.1 | 0.8.1 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/ipfs/go-merkledag. O3's reachability analysis confirms whether the vulnerable code path is actually invoked in your application, so you act on real exposure instead of every transitive match.
Fix
Update github.com/ipfs/go-merkledag to 0.8.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2022-23495 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 pinpoints whether CVE-2022-23495 is reachable in your code and exactly where to fix it, then blocks exploitation in production at runtime until the patched version is deployed.
Tailored to CVE-2022-23495. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2022-23495 in your dependencies?
O3 detects CVE-2022-23495 across Go dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.