How severe is CVE-2023-29195?

CVE-2023-29195 has a CVSS score of 4.1/10, rated MEDIUM. Review your exposure and patch according to your risk tolerance.

Which packages are affected by CVE-2023-29195?

CVE-2023-29195 affects the following packages: vitess.io/vitess (Go). Ecosystems affected: Go.

How do I fix CVE-2023-29195?

Update vitess.io/vitess to 0.16.2 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2023-29195 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.

How do I detect CVE-2023-29195 in my Go dependencies?

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

How do I mitigate CVE-2023-29195 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-2023-29195 actively exploited in the wild?

Yes. There are 1 known exploit references for CVE-2023-29195, 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-2023-29195?

CVE-2023-29195 has an EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) score of 1.0%, placing it in the 63th 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-2023-29195?

CVE-2023-29195 is classified as Improper Input Validation (CWE-20), CWE-703 (CWE-703). These weakness types describe the underlying flaw category, which helps determine the potential impact and the right class of mitigation.

When was CVE-2023-29195 published, and has it been updated?

CVE-2023-29195 was published on May 11, 2023 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.

🐹

🐹 Go

Not in CISA KEV

MEDIUM severity

CVE-2023-29195 — vitess

MEDIUMFix: vitessio/vitess@9dcbd7d

CVE-2023-29195 is a medium-severity (CVSS 4.1) Improper Input Validation vulnerability in vitess.io/vitess. 1 public exploit or proof-of-concept reference is indexed, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for vitess.io/vitess — see the affected versions and patch details below.

Vitess VTAdmin users that can create shards can deny access to other functions

Also known asGHSA-pqj7-jx24-wj7w

Published

May 11, 2023

Updated

Oct 28, 2026

Affected

1 pkg

Patched

1 / 1

Exploits

1 known

Exploitation data as of Nov 7, 2026 · OSV.dev, NVD, FIRST.org (EPSS)

Exploitation Status

No confirmed exploitation observed yet

CISA’s own triage has not observed active exploitation or public proof-of-concept code for this CVE as of its last assessment.

Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2023-29195.

EPSS Exploitation Probability

via FIRST.org ↗

1.0%probability of exploitation in next 30 days

Lower Risk0.00%

Lower risk than most CVEs63th percentile — riskier than 63% 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

🐹vitess.io/vitess

Real-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

Impact

Users can either intentionally or inadvertently create a shard containing / characters from VTAdmin such that from that point on, anyone who tries to create a new shard from VTAdmin will receive an error. Attempting to view the keyspace(s) will also no longer work. Creating a shard using vtctldclient does not have the same problem because the CLI validates the input correctly.

Patches

v16.0.2, corresponding to 0.16.2 on pkg.go.dev

Workarounds

Always use vtctldclient to create shards, instead of using VTAdmin
Disable creating shards from VTAdmin using RBAC
Delete the topology record for the offending shard using the client for your topology server. For example, if you created a shard called a/b in keyspace commerce, and you are running etcd, it can be deleted by doing something like

% etcdctl --endpoints "http://${ETCD_SERVER}" del /vitess/global/keyspaces/commerce/shards/a/b/Shard

References

https://github.com/vitessio/vitess/issues/12842

Found during a security audit sponsored by the CNCF and facilitated by OSTIF.

Affected Packages

1 total 1 fixed

Ecosystem	Package	Vulnerable range	Fix
🐹Go	`vitess.io/vitess`	all versions	0.16.2`go get vitess.io/vitess@v0.16.2`

Affected Products

1 product · 1 configurations

Application

vitesslinuxfoundation

< 16.0.2

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.

Vitess is a database clustering system for horizontal scaling of MySQL t…

github.comNVDMay 2023

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency

Detect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for vitess.io/vitess, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update vitess.io/vitess to 0.16.2 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2023-29195 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.

Frequently Asked Questions

### Impact Users can either intentionally or inadvertently create a shard containing `/` characters from VTAdmin such that from that point on, anyone who tries to create a new shard from VTAdmin will receive an error. Attempting to view the keyspace(s) will also no longer work. Creating a shard using `vtctldclient` does not have the same problem because the CLI validates the input correctly. ### Patches v16.0.2, corresponding to [0.16.2 on pkg.go.dev](https://pkg.go.dev/vitess.io/[email protected]) ### Workarounds - Always use `vtctldclient` to create shards, instead of using VTAdmin - Disable