CVE-2022-36083 is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.3) Uncontrolled Resource Consumption vulnerability in jose. 1 public exploit reference exists, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for jose — see the affected versions and patch details below.
JOSE vulnerable to resource exhaustion via specifically crafted JWE
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-2022-36083.
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-2022-36083 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.
josenpmjose-browser-runtimenpmjose-node-cjs-runtimenpmDescription
JOSE is "JSON Web Almost Everything" - JWA, JWS, JWE, JWT, JWK, JWKS with no dependencies using runtime's native crypto in Node.js, Browser, Cloudflare Workers, Electron, and Deno. The PBKDF2-based JWE key management algorithms expect a JOSE Header Parameter named p2c PBES2 Count, which determines how many PBKDF2 iterations must be executed in order to derive a CEK wrapping key. The purpose of this parameter is to intentionally slow down the key derivation function in order to make password brute-force and dictionary attacks more expensive. This makes the PBES2 algorithms unsuitable for situations where the JWE is coming from an untrusted source: an adversary can intentionally pick an extremely high PBES2 Count value, that will initiate a CPU-bound computation that may take an unreasonable amount of time to finish. Under certain conditions, it is possible to have the user's environment consume unreasonable amount of CPU time. The impact is limited only to users utilizing the JWE decryption APIs with symmetric secrets to decrypt JWEs from untrusted parties who do not limit the accepted JWE Key Management Algorithms (alg Header Parameter) using the keyManagementAlgorithms (or algorithms in v1.x) decryption option or through other means. The v1.28.2, v2.0.6, v3.20.4, and v4.9.2 releases limit the maximum PBKDF2 iteration count to 10000 by default. It is possible to adjust this limit with a newly introduced maxPBES2Count decryption option. If users are unable to upgrade their required library version, they have two options depending on whether they expect to receive JWEs using any of the three PBKDF2-based JWE key management algorithms. They can use the keyManagementAlgorithms decryption option to disable accepting PBKDF2 altogether, or they can inspect the JOSE Header prior to using the decryption API and limit the PBKDF2 iteration count (p2c Header Parameter).
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | jose | ≥ 1.0.0&&< 1.28.2 | 1.28.2npm install jose@1.28.2 |
| 📦npm | jose-browser-runtime | ≥ 3.0.0&&< 3.20.4 | 3.20.4npm install jose-browser-runtime@3.20.4 |
| 📦npm | jose-node-cjs-runtime | ≥ 3.0.0&&< 3.20.4 | 3.20.4npm install jose-node-cjs-runtime@3.20.4 |
| 📦npm | jose-node-esm-runtime | ≥ 3.0.0&&< 3.20.4 | 3.20.4npm install jose-node-esm-runtime@3.20.4 |
| 📦npm | jose | ≥ 2.0.0&&< 2.0.6 | 2.0.6npm install jose@2.0.6 |
| 📦npm | jose | ≥ 3.0.0&&< 3.20.4 | 3.20.4npm install jose@3.20.4 |
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 jose, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update jose to 1.28.2 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2022-36083 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-2022-36083 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to CVE-2022-36083. 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-2022-36083 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds CVE-2022-36083 across npm dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.