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GHSA-gxpj-cx7g-858c

LOW

GHSA-gxpj-cx7g-858c is a low-severity (CVSS 3.7) Uncontrolled Resource Consumption vulnerability in debug. O3 Security confirms whether GHSA-gxpj-cx7g-858c is actually reachable in your code before you act, and blocks exploitation at runtime until you patch.

Regular Expression Denial of Service in debug

Also known asCVE-2017-16137
Published
Aug 9, 2018
Updated
Feb 4, 2026
Affected
4 pkgs
Patched
4 / 4
Exploits
None indexed

Blast Radius

4 pkgs affected

Weekly download volume for affected packages — a proxy for how broadly this vulnerability is deployed.

debugnpm
687.1Mdownloads / week

Description

Affected versions of debug are vulnerable to regular expression denial of service when untrusted user input is passed into the o formatter.

As it takes 50,000 characters to block the event loop for 2 seconds, this issue is a low severity issue.

This was later re-introduced in version v3.2.0, and then repatched in versions 3.2.7 and 4.3.1.

Recommendation

Version 2.x.x: Update to version 2.6.9 or later. Version 3.1.x: Update to version 3.1.0 or later. Version 3.2.x: Update to version 3.2.7 or later. Version 4.x.x: Update to version 4.3.1 or later.

Affected Packages

4 total 4 fixed
EcosystemPackageVulnerable rangeFix
📦npmdebugall versions2.6.9
📦npmdebug3.0.0&&< 3.1.03.1.0
📦npmdebug3.2.0&&< 3.2.73.2.7
📦npmdebug4.0.0&&< 4.3.14.3.1

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency
  1. Detect

    Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for debug. 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.

  2. Fix

    Update debug to 2.6.9 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-gxpj-cx7g-858c is resolved across your whole dependency graph.

  3. 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.

  4. How O3 protects you

    O3 pinpoints whether GHSA-gxpj-cx7g-858c 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-gxpj-cx7g-858c. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Affected versions of `debug` are vulnerable to regular expression denial of service when untrusted user input is passed into the `o` formatter. As it takes 50,000 characters to block the event loop for 2 seconds, this issue is a low severity issue. This was later re-introduced in version v3.2.0, and then repatched in versions 3.2.7 and 4.3.1. ## Recommendation Version 2.x.x: Update to version 2.6.9 or later. Version 3.1.x: Update to version 3.1.0 or later. Version 3.2.x: Update to version 3.2.7 or later. Version 4.x.x: Update to version 4.3.1 or later.
O3 Security · Impact-Aware SCA

Is GHSA-gxpj-cx7g-858c in your dependencies?

O3 detects GHSA-gxpj-cx7g-858c across npm dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.