GHSA-6q22-g298-grjh
HIGHDirectus: Unauthenticated Denial of Service via GraphQL Alias Amplification of Expensive Health Check Resolver
Blast Radius
Weekly download volume for affected packages — a proxy for how broadly this vulnerability is deployed.
directusnpmDescription
Summary
The GraphQL specification permits a single query to repeat the same field multiple times using aliases, with each alias resolved independently by default. Directus did not deduplicate resolver invocations within a single request, meaning each alias triggered a full, independent execution of the underlying resolver.
The health check resolver ran all backend checks (database connectivity, cache, storage writes, and SMTP verification) on every invocation. Combined with unauthenticated access to the system GraphQL endpoint, this allowed an attacker to amplify resource consumption significantly from a single HTTP request, exhausting the database connection pool, storage I/O, and SMTP connections.
Fix
A request-scoped resolver deduplication mechanism was introduced and applied broadly across all GraphQL read resolvers, both system and items endpoints. When multiple aliases in a single request invoke the same resolver with identical arguments, only the first call executes; all subsequent aliases share its result. This eliminates the amplification factor regardless of how many aliases an attacker includes in a query.
Impact
- Service degradation or outage: Database connection pool exhaustion prevents all Directus operations for all users
- Storage I/O saturation: Concurrent file writes can overwhelm disk I/O
- SMTP resource exhaustion: Concurrent SMTP verification calls may overwhelm the mail server
- No authentication required: Any network-accessible attacker can trigger this condition
- Single-request impact: A single request is sufficient to cause significant resource consumption
Credit
This vulnerability was discovered and reported by bugbunny.ai.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | directus | all versions | 11.17.0 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for directus. 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 directus to 11.17.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-6q22-g298-grjh 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-6q22-g298-grjh 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-6q22-g298-grjh. 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-6q22-g298-grjh in your dependencies?
O3 detects GHSA-6q22-g298-grjh across npm dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.