How severe is CVE-2022-29181?

CVE-2022-29181 has a CVSS score of 8.2/10, rated HIGH. Immediate patching is strongly recommended.

Which packages are affected by CVE-2022-29181?

CVE-2022-29181 affects the following packages: nokogiri (RubyGems). Ecosystems affected: RubyGems.

How do I fix CVE-2022-29181?

Update nokogiri to 1.13.6 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2022-29181 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.

How do I detect CVE-2022-29181 in my RubyGems dependencies?

Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for nokogiri, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.

How do I mitigate CVE-2022-29181 if there is no patch (or I can't update yet)?

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.

Is CVE-2022-29181 actively exploited in the wild?

Yes. There are 1 known exploit references for CVE-2022-29181, including 1 in-the-wild exploitation observed on GitHub and other sources. Treat this as actively exploitable and prioritize patching immediately. All exploit code should only be run in an isolated sandbox environment for research or authorized testing — never against production systems without explicit written authorization.

What is the EPSS score for CVE-2022-29181?

CVE-2022-29181 has an EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) score of 3.2%, placing it in the 88th percentile of all CVEs. EPSS is maintained by FIRST.org and estimates the probability that a vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days. This score indicates relatively lower exploitation probability, though the CVSS severity should still guide your patching priority.

What type of vulnerability is CVE-2022-29181?

CVE-2022-29181 is classified as CWE-241 (CWE-241), CWE-843 (CWE-843). These weakness types describe the underlying flaw category, which helps determine the potential impact and the right class of mitigation.

When was CVE-2022-29181 published, and has it been updated?

CVE-2022-29181 was published on May 20, 2022 and was last updated on October 28, 2026. Advisory data evolves as severity scores, affected ranges, and exploit intelligence are revised — always check the latest version of the advisory before acting.

💎

💎 RubyGems

Not in CISA KEV

HIGH severity

CVE-2022-29181 — nokogiri

HIGHFix: sparklemotion/nokogiri@83cc451

CVE-2022-29181 is a high-severity (CVSS 8.2) CWE-241 vulnerability in nokogiri. 1 public exploit or proof-of-concept reference is indexed, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for nokogiri — see the affected versions and patch details below.

Improper Handling of Unexpected Data Type in Nokogiri

Also known asGHSA-xh29-r2w5-wx8m

Published

May 20, 2022

Updated

Oct 28, 2026

Affected

1 pkg

Patched

1 / 1

Exploits

1 known

Exploitation data as of Nov 3, 2026 · OSV.dev, NVD, FIRST.org (EPSS)

Exploitation Status

Proof-of-concept exploit code exists

CISA’s SSVC triage found public proof-of-concept exploit code for this CVE, though no confirmed active exploitation.
CISA assesses this as automatable — exploitation doesn’t require manual, per-target effort, which raises the odds of mass scanning and opportunistic attacks.

Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2022-29181.

EPSS Exploitation Probability

via FIRST.org ↗

3.2%probability of exploitation in next 30 days

Lower Risk0.00%

Lower risk than most CVEs88th percentile — riskier than 88% of all scored CVEsHighest risk

Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, from FIRST.org EPSS.

How urgent is this, really

Where this sits among everything scored

Real-World Exposure

1 pkg affected

💎nokogiri

Real-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects RubyGems packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.

Description

Summary

Nokogiri < v1.13.6 does not type-check all inputs into the XML and HTML4 SAX parsers. For CRuby users, this may allow specially crafted untrusted inputs to cause illegal memory access errors (segfault) or reads from unrelated memory.

Severity

The Nokogiri maintainers have evaluated this as High 8.2 (CVSS3.1).

Mitigation

CRuby users should upgrade to Nokogiri >= 1.13.6.

JRuby users are not affected.

Workarounds

To avoid this vulnerability in affected applications, ensure the untrusted input is a String by calling #to_s or equivalent.

Credit

This vulnerability was responsibly reported by @agustingianni and the Github Security Lab.

Affected Packages

1 total 1 fixed

Ecosystem	Package	Vulnerable range	Fix
💎RubyGems	`nokogiri`	all versions	1.13.6`bundle update nokogiri --conservative`

Affected Products

2 products · 2 configurations

macosapple

≥ 13.0 && < 13.1

range

Application

nokogirinokogiri

< 1.13.6

range

Exploits & PoCs

Research use only. For defensive security, authorized penetration testing, and academic research only. Never execute exploit code against systems without explicit written authorization.

Nokogiri is an open source XML and HTML library for Ruby. Nokogiri prior…

securitylab.github.comNVDJun 2022

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency

Detect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for nokogiri, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update nokogiri to 1.13.6 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2022-29181 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.

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.

Red HatImportant

Red Hat Satellite 6.12 and later versions are not affected by this flaw.

Workaround published by Red Hat

To avoid this vulnerability in affected applications, ensure the untrusted input is a String by calling #to_s or equivalent.

Source: Red Hat security advisory for CVE-2022-29181 (CC BY 4.0)

Product	Fixed in	Advisory
Red Hat Satellite 6.12 for RHEL 8	`tfm-rubygem-nokogiri-0:1.13.8-1.el8sat`	RHSA-2022:8506

Frequently Asked Questions

### Summary Nokogiri `< v1.13.6` does not type-check all inputs into the XML and HTML4 SAX parsers. For CRuby users, this may allow specially crafted untrusted inputs to cause illegal memory access errors (segfault) or reads from unrelated memory. ### Severity The Nokogiri maintainers have evaluated this as **High 8.2** (CVSS3.1). ### Mitigation CRuby users should upgrade to Nokogiri `>= 1.13.6`. JRuby users are not affected. ### Workarounds To avoid this vulnerability in affected applications, ensure the untrusted input is a `String` by calling `#to_s` or equivalent. ### Credit T