CVE-2024-28863 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) Uncontrolled Resource Consumption vulnerability in node-tar. A fix is available for node-tar — see the affected versions and patch details below.
node-tar vulnerable to denial of service while parsing a tar file due to lack of folders count validation
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.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2024-28863.
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-2024-28863 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 377,636 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, a proxy for how much of the ecosystem is exposed.
node-tarnpmtarnpmDescription
Description:
During some analysis today on npm's node-tar package I came across the folder creation process, Basicly if you provide node-tar with a path like this ./a/b/c/foo.txt it would create every folder and sub-folder here a, b and c until it reaches the last folder to create foo.txt, In-this case I noticed that there's no validation at all on the amount of folders being created, that said we're actually able to CPU and memory consume the system running node-tar and even crash the nodejs client within few seconds of running it using a path with too many sub-folders inside
Steps To Reproduce:
You can reproduce this issue by downloading the tar file I provided in the resources and using node-tar to extract it, you should get the same behavior as the video
Proof Of Concept:
Here's a video show-casing the exploit:
Impact
Denial of service by crashing the nodejs client when attempting to parse a tar archive, make it run out of heap memory and consuming server CPU and memory resources
Report resources
Note
This report was originally reported to GitHub bug bounty program, they asked me to report it to you a month ago
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | node-tar | all versions | 6.2.1npm install node-tar@6.2.1 |
| 📦npm | tar | all versions | 6.2.1npm install tar@6.2.1 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for node-tar, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update node-tar to 6.2.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2024-28863 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-2024-28863 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to CVE-2024-28863. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
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.
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| OpenShift-Pipelines-1.16-RHEL-8 | openshift-pipelines/pipelines-chains-controller-rhel8:v1.16.0-6 | RHEA-2024:7870 |
| Red Hat Developer Hub 1.2 on RHEL 9 | rhdh/rhdh-hub-rhel9:1.2-132 | RHBA-2024:4924 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | nodejs:20-8100020240808073736.489197e6 | RHSA-2024:5814 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | nodejs:18-8100020240807161023.489197e6 | RHSA-2024:6148 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 | nodejs:18-9040020240807131341.rhel9 | RHSA-2024:6147 |
| Red Hat Migration Toolkit for Containers 1.8 | rhmtc/openshift-migration-ui-rhel8:v1.8.4-10 | RHSA-2024:7164 |
| RHODF-4.16-RHEL-9 | odf4/mcg-core-rhel9:v4.16.0-60 | RHSA-2024:4591 |
| RHODF-4.16-RHEL-9 | odf4/ocs-client-console-rhel9:v4.16.2-2 | RHSA-2024:6755 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2024-28863 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds CVE-2024-28863 across npm dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.