GHSA-2mr3-m5q5-wgp6 — v3
HIGHGHSA-2mr3-m5q5-wgp6 is a high-severity (CVSS 7.5) CWE-789 vulnerability in github.com/gofiber/fiber/v3. A fix is available for github.com/gofiber/fiber/v3 — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Fiber is Vulnerable to Denial of Service via Flash Cookie Unbounded Allocation
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation observed yet
- CISA assesses this as automatable — exploitation doesn’t require manual, per-target effort, which raises the odds of mass scanning and opportunistic attacks.
- CISA’s own triage has not observed active exploitation or public proof-of-concept code for this CVE as of its last assessment.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for GHSA-2mr3-m5q5-wgp6.
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
GHSA-2mr3-m5q5-wgp6 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 377,333 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
github.com/gofiber/fiber/v3Real-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Go packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Summary
The use of the fiber_flash cookie can force an unbounded allocation on any server. A crafted 10-character cookie value triggers an attempt to allocate up to 85GB of memory via unvalidated msgpack deserialization. No authentication is required. Every GoFiber v3 endpoint is affected regardless of whether the application uses flash messages.
Details
Regardless of configuration, the flash cookie is checked:
func (app *App) requestHandler(rctx *fasthttp.RequestCtx) {
// Acquire context from the pool
ctx := app.AcquireCtx(rctx)
defer app.ReleaseCtx(ctx)
// Optional: Check flash messages
rawHeaders := d.Request().Header.RawHeaders()
if len(rawHeaders) > 0 && bytes.Contains(rawHeaders, flashCookieNameBytes) {
d.Redirect().parseAndClearFlashMessages()
}
_, err = app.next(d)
} else {
// Check if the HTTP method is valid
if ctx.getMethodInt() == -1 {
_ = ctx.SendStatus(StatusNotImplemented) //nolint:errcheck // Always return nil
return
}
// Optional: Check flash messages
rawHeaders := ctx.Request().Header.RawHeaders()
if len(rawHeaders) > 0 && bytes.Contains(rawHeaders, flashCookieNameBytes) {
ctx.Redirect().parseAndClearFlashMessages()
}
}
The cookie value is hex-decoded and passed directly to msgpack deserialization with no size or content validation:
https://github.com/gofiber/fiber/blob/f8f34f642fb3682c341ede7816e7cf861aa7df89/redirect.go#L371
// parseAndClearFlashMessages is a method to get flash messages before they are getting removed
func (r *Redirect) parseAndClearFlashMessages() {
// parse flash messages
cookieValue, err := hex.DecodeString(r.c.Cookies(FlashCookieName))
if err != nil {
return
}
_, err = r.c.flashMessages.UnmarshalMsg(cookieValue)
if err != nil {
return
}
r.c.Cookie(&Cookie{
Name: FlashCookieName,
Value: "",
Path: "/",
MaxAge: -1,
})
}
The auto-generated tinylib/msgp deserialization reads a uint32 array header from the attacker-controlled byte stream and passes it directly to make() with no bounds check:
https://github.com/gofiber/fiber/blob/f8f34f642fb3682c341ede7816e7cf861aa7df89/redirect_msgp.go#L242
// UnmarshalMsg implements msgp.Unmarshaler
func (z *redirectionMsgs) UnmarshalMsg(bts []byte) (o []byte, err error) {
var zb0002 uint32
zb0002, bts, err = msgp.ReadArrayHeaderBytes(bts)
if err != nil {
err = msgp.WrapError(err)
return o, err
}
if cap((*z)) >= int(zb0002) {
(*z) = (*z)[:zb0002]
} else {
(*z) = make(redirectionMsgs, zb0002)
}
for zb0001 := range *z {
bts, err = (*z)[zb0001].UnmarshalMsg(bts)
if err != nil {
err = msgp.WrapError(err, zb0001)
return o, err
}
}
o = bts
return o, err
}
where
zb0002, bts, err = msgp.ReadArrayHeaderBytes(bts) translates the attacker-controlled value into the element count and make(redirectionMsgs, zb0002) performs the unbounded allocation
So we can craft a gofiber cookie that will force a huge allocation:
curl -H "Cookie: fiber_flash=dd7fffffff" http://localhost:5000/hello
The cookie val is a hex-encoded msgpack array32 header:
dd= msgpack array32 marker7fffffff= 2 147 483 647 elements
Impact
Unauthenticated remote Denial of Service (CWE-789). Anyone running a gofiber v3.0.0 or v3 server is affected. The flash cookie parsing is hardcoded.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐹Go | github.com/gofiber/fiber/v3 | all versions | 3.1.0go get github.com/gofiber/fiber/v3@v3.1.0 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/gofiber/fiber/v3, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update github.com/gofiber/fiber/v3 to 3.1.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-2mr3-m5q5-wgp6 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 GHSA-2mr3-m5q5-wgp6 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-2mr3-m5q5-wgp6. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is GHSA-2mr3-m5q5-wgp6 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-2mr3-m5q5-wgp6 across Go dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.