CVE-2023-43796 is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.3) Information Exposure vulnerability in matrix-synapse. A fix is available for matrix-synapse — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Synapse vulnerable to leak of remote user device information
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-2023-43796 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 378,156 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
matrix-synapseReal-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
Synapse is an open-source Matrix homeserver Prior to versions 1.95.1 and 1.96.0rc1, cached device information of remote users can be queried from Synapse. This can be used to enumerate the remote users known to a homeserver. System administrators are encouraged to upgrade to Synapse 1.95.1 or 1.96.0rc1 to receive a patch. As a workaround, the federation_domain_whitelist can be used to limit federation traffic with a homeserver.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐍PyPI | matrix-synapse | all versions | 1.95.1pip install --upgrade 'matrix-synapse==1.95.1' |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for matrix-synapse, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update matrix-synapse to 1.95.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2023-43796 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-2023-43796 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to CVE-2023-43796. 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-2023-43796 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds CVE-2023-43796 across PyPI dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.