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MEDIUM severity

CVE-2026-45736 — ws

MEDIUMFix: websockets/ws@c0327ec

CVE-2026-45736 is a medium-severity (CVSS 4.4) CWE-908 vulnerability in ws. A fix is available for ws — see the affected versions and patch details below.

ws: Uninitialized memory disclosure

Also known asGHSA-58qx-3vcg-4xpx
Published
May 15, 2026
Updated
Sep 15, 2026
Affected
1 pkg
Patched
1 / 1
Exploits
None indexed
Exploitation data as of Sep 28, 2026 · OSV.dev, NVD, FIRST.org (EPSS)

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-2026-45736.

EPSS Exploitation Probability

via FIRST.org ↗
0.7%probability of exploitation in next 30 days
Lower Risk0.00%
Lower risk than most CVEs50th percentile — riskier than 50% of all scored CVEsHighest risk

Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, from FIRST.org EPSS.

How urgent is this, really

CVE-2026-45736 by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). Outside the shaded patch-first corner.

Where this sits among everything scored

Of 380,526 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Counts from FIRST.org, log-scaled.

Real-World Exposure

1 pkg affected

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.

38Kother npm packages depend on this — each one inherits the vulnerability until it's patched upstream
wsnpm
309.7Mdownloads / week

Description

Impact

The websocket.close() implementation is vulnerable to uninitialized memory disclosure when a TypedArray is passed as the reason argument.

Proof of concept

import { deepStrictEqual } from 'node:assert';
import { WebSocket, WebSocketServer } from 'ws';

const wss = new WebSocketServer(
  { port: 0, skipUTF8Validation: true },
  function () {
    const { port } = wss.address();
    const ws = new WebSocket(`ws://localhost:${port}`, {
      skipUTF8Validation: true
    });

    ws.on('close', function (code, reason) {
      deepStrictEqual(reason, Buffer.alloc(80));
    });
  }
);

wss.on('connection', function (ws) {
  ws.close(1000, new Float32Array(20));
});

Patches

The vulnerability was fixed in [email protected] (https://github.com/websockets/ws/commit/c0327ec15a54d701eb6ccefaa8bef328cfc03086).

Credits

Credit for the private and responsible disclosure of this issue goes to Nikita Skovoroda.

Remarks

Although the calculated CVSS severity is medium, the actual severity is believed to be low, as the flaw is only exploitable through misuse that is unlikely in practice.

Resources

Affected Packages

1 total 1 fixed
EcosystemPackageVulnerable rangeFix
📦npmws≥ 8.0.0&&< 8.20.18.20.1npm install ws@8.20.1

Affected Products

1 product · 1 configurations
Application
wsws_project
≥ 8.0.0 && < 8.20.1
range

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency
  1. Detect

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

  2. Fix

    Update ws to 8.20.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2026-45736 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.

  3. 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.

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.

Red HatImportant

This Important vulnerability in the `ws` WebSocket library for Node.js could lead to sensitive information disclosure. The flaw occurs when a `TypedArray` is specifically provided as the `reason` argument to the `websocket.close()` function, potentially exposing uninitialized memory. Red Hat products utilizing this…

ProductFixed inAdvisory
Cryostat 4 on RHEL 9cryostat/cryostat-openshift-console-plugin-rhel9:4.2.0-13RHSA-2026:48151
Red Hat AMQ Broker 7.13.6wsRHSA-2026:66545
Red Hat AMQ Broker 7.14.1wsRHSA-2026:66488
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10rh-podman-desktop-0:1.1.2-1.el10_2RHSA-2026:57590
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform 2.6ansible-automation-platform-26/gateway-rhel9:1782761510RHSA-2026:34374
Red Hat Developer Hub 1.10rhdh/rhdh-hub-rhel9:1783448184RHSA-2026:36754
Red Hat Developer Hub 1.9rhdh/rhdh-hub-rhel9:1782761244RHSA-2026:33574
Red Hat Discovery 2discovery/discovery-ui-rhel9:1782166952RHSA-2026:29197

Frequently Asked Questions

### Impact The `websocket.close()` implementation is vulnerable to uninitialized memory disclosure when a `TypedArray` is passed as the reason argument. ### Proof of concept ```js import { deepStrictEqual } from 'node:assert'; import { WebSocket, WebSocketServer } from 'ws'; const wss = new WebSocketServer( { port: 0, skipUTF8Validation: true }, function () { const { port } = wss.address(); const ws = new WebSocket(`ws://localhost:${port}`, { skipUTF8Validation: true }); ws.on('close', function (code, reason) { deepStrictEqual(reason, Buffer.alloc(80));
O3 Security · Impact-Aware SCA

Is CVE-2026-45736 in your dependencies?

Find it across npm, including transitive dependencies.

CVE-2026-45736: ws (Medium 4.4) | O3 Security