GHSA-98wm-cxpw-847p is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.4) Cross-site Scripting (XSS) vulnerability in invoiceninja/invoiceninja. A fix is available for invoiceninja/invoiceninja — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Invoice Ninja Denylist Bypass may Lead to Stored XSS via Invoice Line Items
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-98wm-cxpw-847p.
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-98wm-cxpw-847p 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% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
invoiceninja/invoiceninjaReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Packagist packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Vulnerability Details
Invoice line item descriptions in Invoice Ninja v5.13.0 bypass the XSS denylist filter, allowing stored XSS payloads to execute when invoices are rendered in the PDF preview or client portal.
The line item description field was not passed through purify::clean() before rendering.
Steps to Reproduce
- Login as any authenticated user
- Create or edit an invoice
- In a line item description, enter:
<img src=x onerror=alert(document.cookie)> - Save the invoice and preview it
- The XSS payload executes in the browser
Impact
- Attacker: Any authenticated user who can create invoices
- Victim: Any user viewing the invoice (including clients via the portal)
- Specific damage: Session hijacking, account takeover, data exfiltration
Proposed Fix
Fixed in v5.13.4 by the vendor by adding purify::clean() to sanitize line item descriptions.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐘Packagist | invoiceninja/invoiceninja | all versions | 5.13.4composer require invoiceninja/invoiceninja:^5.13.4 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for invoiceninja/invoiceninja, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update invoiceninja/invoiceninja to 5.13.4 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-98wm-cxpw-847p 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-98wm-cxpw-847p can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-98wm-cxpw-847p. 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-98wm-cxpw-847p in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-98wm-cxpw-847p across Packagist dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.