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HIGH severity

GHSA-2mhw-8qcg-gr96 — skia-python

HIGH

GHSA-2mhw-8qcg-gr96 is a high-severity (CVSS 8.1) vulnerability in skia-python. A fix is available for skia-python — see the affected versions and patch details below.

skia-python vendors vulnerable libfreetype because of pinned cibuildwheel version

Published
Mar 19, 2026
Updated
Mar 19, 2026
Affected
2 pkgs
Patched
1 / 2
Exploits
None indexed
Exploitation data as of Mar 19, 2026 · OSV.dev, FIRST.org (EPSS)

Real-World Exposure

2 pkgs affected
🐍skia-python🐍skia-python

Real-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

Impact

The Linux wheels for skia-python vendor a vulnerable version of libfreetype that is affected by CVE-2025-27363 [1].

The root cause is a chain of unfortunate events:

  1. skia-python builds wheels using pinned pypa/[email protected] [2]

  2. cibuildwheel 2.21.3 in turn pins manylinux container images [3]

  3. In these images, version 2.9.1-9.el8 of RedHat package freetype is preinstalled. This package version is vulnerable and has since been patched in 2.9.1-10.

  4. During the skia-python Linux build, libfreetype is vendored from the system, resulting in skia-python.libs/libfreetype-29a7443c.so.6.16.1

[ To find the provenance of your vendored libfreetype, we extracted the 8-character hash of the original binary file that is added during the build process (29a7443c), and matched it against our database of hashes all historic Red Hat, Debian and Ubuntu releases of freetype. ]

  1. Because freetype is only a transitive dependency of the packages explicitly installed by the build script [4], it is not upgraded to the patched version [4].

  2. As a result, the published wheels embed a vulnerable libfreetype, even though patched packages are available upstream.

This appears to be a broader manylinux ecosystem issue. The base images do not enforce that yum update runs on container start, so preinstalled libraries may remain vulnerable indefinitely.

Patches

In the case of skia-python, the solution is to explicitly install freetype in the build process and rebuild the wheels.

The original report was suggesting the above, but in the current build_Linux.sh script, the patched freetype-devel version 2.9.1-10 gets installed as a dependency. It's just that we need to rebuild the wheel for a new release.

Workarounds

Users must upgrade the wheel package after release.

References

  1. https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2025-27363
  2. https://github.com/kyamagu/skia-python/blob/9ffb045811f9b5508e152302d5b81aadca6edd8d/.github/workflows/ci.yml#L38
  3. https://github.com/pypa/cibuildwheel/blob/v2.21.3/cibuildwheel/resources/pinned_docker_images.cfg
  4. https://github.com/kyamagu/skia-python/blob/9ffb045811f9b5508e152302d5b81aadca6edd8d/scripts/build_Linux.sh#L6

Affected Packages

2 total 1 fixed
EcosystemPackageVulnerable rangeFix
🐍PyPIskia-pythonall versionsNo fix
🐍PyPIskia-pythonall versions144.0.post1pip install --upgrade 'skia-python==144.0.post1'

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency

  1. Detect

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

  2. Fix

    No patched version of skia-python has shipped for GHSA-2mhw-8qcg-gr96 yet. Where your build allows, override or pin the dependency away from the vulnerable range, and apply any maintainer-recommended mitigation.

  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.

  4. How O3 protects you

    O3 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like GHSA-2mhw-8qcg-gr96 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.

Tailored to GHSA-2mhw-8qcg-gr96. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.

Frequently Asked Questions

### Impact The Linux wheels for skia-python vendor a vulnerable version of libfreetype that is affected by CVE-2025-27363 [1]. The root cause is a chain of unfortunate events: 1. skia-python builds wheels using pinned pypa/[email protected] [2] 2. cibuildwheel 2.21.3 in turn pins manylinux container images [3] 3. In these images, version 2.9.1-9.el8 of RedHat package freetype is *preinstalled*. This package version is vulnerable and has since been patched in 2.9.1-10. 4. During the skia-python Linux build, libfreetype is vendored from the system, resulting in skia-python.libs/libfreety
O3 Security · Impact-Aware SCA

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GHSA-2mhw-8qcg-gr96: skia-python | O3 Security