GHSA-3f7h-mf4q-vrm4 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) CWE-121 vulnerability in com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-core. 1 public exploit reference exists, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-core — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Denial of Service due to parser crash
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 GHSA-3f7h-mf4q-vrm4.
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-3f7h-mf4q-vrm4 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 379,145 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the 10–50% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-core☕com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-coreReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Maven packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Those using FasterXML/woodstox to seralize XML data may be vulnerable to Denial of Service attacks (DOS). If the parser is running on user supplied input, an attacker may supply content that causes the parser to crash by stackoverflow. This effect may support a denial of service attack.
This vulnerability is only relevant for users making use of the DTD parsing functionality.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☕Maven | com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-core | ≥ 6.0.0&&< 6.4.0 | 6.4.0com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-core:6.4.0 |
| ☕Maven | com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-core | all versions | 5.4.0com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-core:5.4.0 |
Research use only. For defensive security, authorized penetration testing, and academic research only. Never execute exploit code against systems without explicit written authorization.
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-core, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update com.fasterxml.woodstox:woodstox-core to 6.4.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-3f7h-mf4q-vrm4 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-3f7h-mf4q-vrm4 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-3f7h-mf4q-vrm4. 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 |
|---|---|---|
| OCP-Tools-4.13-RHEL-8 | jenkins-0:2.387.3.1684911776-3.el8 | RHSA-2023:3299 |
| Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.1 EUS for RHEL 7 | eap7-activemq-artemis-0:1.5.5.016-1.redhat_00001.1.ep7.el7 | RHSA-2025:4226 |
| Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.3 EUS for RHEL 7 | eap7-activemq-artemis-0:2.9.0-10.redhat_00021.1.el7eap | RHSA-2025:4437 |
| Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.4.9 | com.fasterxml.woodstox/woodstox-core:6.4.0.redhat-00001 | RHSA-2023:0556 |
| Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.4 for RHEL 8 | eap7-woodstox-core-0:6.4.0-1.redhat_00001.1.el8eap | RHSA-2023:0553 |
| Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.4 for RHEL 9 | eap7-woodstox-core-0:6.4.0-1.redhat_00001.1.el9eap | RHSA-2023:0554 |
| Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7.4 on RHEL 7 | eap7-woodstox-core-0:6.4.0-1.redhat_00001.1.el7eap | RHSA-2023:0552 |
| RHINT Camel-Q 2.13.2 | woodstox-core | RHSA-2023:0469 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is GHSA-3f7h-mf4q-vrm4 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-3f7h-mf4q-vrm4 across Maven dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.