GHSA-9c38-2mcm-q7f7
MEDIUMGHSA-9c38-2mcm-q7f7 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.3) CWE-488 vulnerability in n8n. O3 Security confirms whether GHSA-9c38-2mcm-q7f7 is actually reachable in your code before you act, and blocks exploitation at runtime until you patch.
n8n: Merge Node SQL Mode Prototype Pollution
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation observed yet
- CISA’s own triage has not observed active exploitation or public proof-of-concept code for this CVE as of its last assessment.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for GHSA-9c38-2mcm-q7f7.
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-9c38-2mcm-q7f7 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 0 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
How broadly this vulnerability is actually deployed: weekly install volume shows current usage, and reverse-dependency count shows how many other packages break if it stays unpatched.
n8nnpmDescription
Impact
An authenticated user with permission to create or modify workflows could pollute the sandbox used by the Merge node's SQL Query mode. Because the sandbox context was cached and reused across all workflow executions on the instance, prototype mutations introduced by one user's workflow persist into subsequent Merge SQL executions belonging to other users or projects. This allowed a low-privileged attacker to intercept workflow data processed by other users on the same instance.
This issue only affects multi-user n8n instances where more than one user has permission to create and execute workflows containing the Merge node in SQL Query mode.
Patches
The issue has been fixed in n8n versions 2.25.7, and 2.26.2. Users should upgrade to one of these versions or later to remediate the vulnerability.
Workarounds
If upgrading is not immediately possible, administrators should consider the following temporary mitigations:
- Limit workflow creation and editing permissions to fully trusted users only.
- Disable the Merge node by adding
n8n-nodes-base.mergeto theNODES_EXCLUDEenvironment variable.
These workarounds do not fully remediate the risk and should only be used as short-term mitigation measures.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | n8n | ≥ 2.26.0&&< 2.26.2 | 2.26.2 |
| 📦npm | n8n | all versions | 2.25.7 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for n8n. 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 n8n to 2.26.2 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-9c38-2mcm-q7f7 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-9c38-2mcm-q7f7 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-9c38-2mcm-q7f7. 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-9c38-2mcm-q7f7 in your dependencies?
O3 detects GHSA-9c38-2mcm-q7f7 across npm dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.