GHSA-68vr-8f46-vc9f
MEDIUMUsername spoofing in OnionShare
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
onionshare-cliReal-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
Between September 26, 2021 and October 8, 2021, Radically Open Security conducted a penetration test of OnionShare 2.4, funded by the Open Technology Fund's Red Team lab. This is an issue from that penetration test.
- Vulnerability ID: OTF-005
- Vulnerability type: Improper Input Sanitization
- Threat level: Low
Description:
It is possible to change the username to that of another chat participant with an additional space character at the end of the name string.
Technical description:
Assumed users in Chat:
- Alice
- Bob
- Mallory
- Mallory renames to
Alice. - Mallory sends message as
Alice. - Alice and Bob receive a message from Mallory disguised as
Alice, which is hard to distinguish from theAlicein the web interface.
Other (invisible) whitespace characters were found to be working as well.
Impact:
An adversary with access to the chat environment can use the rename feature to impersonate other participants by adding whitespace characters at the end of the username.
Recommendation:
- Remove non-visible characters from the username
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐍PyPI | onionshare-cli | ≥ 2.3&&< 2.5 | 2.5 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for onionshare-cli. 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 onionshare-cli to 2.5 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-68vr-8f46-vc9f 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-68vr-8f46-vc9f 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-68vr-8f46-vc9f. 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-68vr-8f46-vc9f in your dependencies?
O3 detects GHSA-68vr-8f46-vc9f across PyPI dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.