CVE-2024-45405
MEDIUMgix-path improperly resolves configuration path reported by Git
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.
Blast Radius
gix-pathReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects crates.io packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
gix-path is a crate of the gitoxide project (an implementation of git written in Rust) dealing paths and their conversions. Prior to version 0.10.11, gix-path runs git to find the path of a configuration file associated with the git installation, but improperly resolves paths containing unusual or non-ASCII characters, in rare cases enabling a local attacker to inject configuration leading to code execution. Version 0.10.11 contains a patch for the issue.
In gix_path::env, the underlying implementation of the installation_config and installation_config_prefix functions calls git config -l --show-origin to find the path of a file to treat as belonging to the git installation. Affected versions of gix-path do not pass -z/--null to cause git to report literal paths. Instead, to cover the occasional case that git outputs a quoted path, they attempt to parse the path by stripping the quotation marks. The problem is that, when a path is quoted, it may change in substantial ways beyond the concatenation of quotation marks. If not reversed, these changes can result in another valid path that is not equivalent to the original.
On a single-user system, it is not possible to exploit this, unless GIT_CONFIG_SYSTEM and GIT_CONFIG_GLOBAL have been set to unusual values or Git has been installed in an unusual way. Such a scenario is not expected. Exploitation is unlikely even on a multi-user system, though it is plausible in some uncommon configurations or use cases. In general, exploitation is more likely to succeed if users are expected to install git themselves, and are likely to do so in predictable locations; locations where git is installed, whether due to usernames in their paths or otherwise, contain characters that git quotes by default in paths, such as non-English letters and accented letters; a custom system-scope configuration file is specified with the GIT_CONFIG_SYSTEM environment variable, and its path is in an unusual location or has strangely named components; or a system-scope configuration file is absent, empty, or suppressed by means other than GIT_CONFIG_NOSYSTEM. Currently, gix-path can treat a global-scope configuration file as belonging to the installation if no higher scope configuration file is available. This increases the likelihood of exploitation even on a system where git is installed system-wide in an ordinary way. However, exploitation is expected to be very difficult even under any combination of those factors.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🦀crates.io | gix-path | all versions | 0.10.11 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for gix-path. O3's reachability analysis confirms whether the vulnerable code path is actually invoked in your application, so you act on real exposure instead of every transitive match.
Fix
Update gix-path to 0.10.11 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2024-45405 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 pinpoints whether CVE-2024-45405 is reachable in your code and exactly where to fix it, then blocks exploitation in production at runtime until the patched version is deployed.
Tailored to CVE-2024-45405. 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-2024-45405 in your dependencies?
O3 detects CVE-2024-45405 across crates.io dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.