GHSA-5v7r-6r5c-r473
MEDIUMfile-type affected by infinite loop in ASF parser on malformed input with zero-size sub-header
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
file-typeReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects npm packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Impact
A denial of service vulnerability exists in the ASF (WMV/WMA) file type detection parser. When parsing a crafted input where an ASF sub-header has a size field of zero, the parser enters an infinite loop. The payload value becomes negative (-24), causing tokenizer.ignore(payload) to move the read position backwards, so the same sub-header is read repeatedly forever.
Any application that uses file-type to detect the type of untrusted/attacker-controlled input is affected. An attacker can stall the Node.js event loop with a 55-byte payload.
Patches
Fixed in version 21.3.1. Users should upgrade to >= 21.3.1.
Workarounds
Validate or limit the size of input buffers before passing them to file-type, or run file type detection in a worker thread with a timeout.
References
- Fix commit: 319abf871b50ba2fa221b4a7050059f1ae096f4f
Reporter
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | file-type | ≥ 13.0.0&&< 21.3.1 | 21.3.1 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for file-type. 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 file-type to 21.3.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-5v7r-6r5c-r473 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 GHSA-5v7r-6r5c-r473 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 GHSA-5v7r-6r5c-r473. 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-5v7r-6r5c-r473 in your dependencies?
O3 detects GHSA-5v7r-6r5c-r473 across npm dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.