GHSA-h4f5-h82v-5w4r is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) CWE-248 vulnerability in surrealdb. A fix is available for surrealdb — see the affected versions and patch details below.
SurrealDB has an Uncaught Exception in Function Generating Random Time
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-h4f5-h82v-5w4r.
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-h4f5-h82v-5w4r 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 378,156 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
surrealdb🦀surrealdb-coreReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects crates.io packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
The rand::time() function in SurrealQL generates a random time from an optional range of two Unix timestamps. Due to the underlying use of timestamp_opt from the chrono crate, this function could potentially return None in some instances, leading to a panic when unwrap was called on its result in order to return a SurrealQL datetime type to the caller of the function.
Impact
A client that is authorized to run queries in a SurrealDB server would be able to make repeated (in the order of millions) calls to rand::time() in order to reliably trigger a panic. This would crash the server, leading to denial of service.
Patches
The function has been updated in to guarantee that some datetime is returned or that an error is otherwise gracefully handled.
- Version 2.1.0 and later are not affected by this issue.
Workarounds
Affected users who are unable to update may want to limit the ability of untrusted clients to run the rand::time() function in the affected versions of SurrealDB using security capabilities. To limit the impact of the denial of service, SurrealDB administrators may also want to ensure that the SurrealDB process is running so that it can be automatically re-started after a crash.
References
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🦀crates.io | surrealdb | all versions | 2.1.0cargo update -p surrealdb --precise 2.1.0 |
| 🦀crates.io | surrealdb-core | all versions | 2.1.0cargo update -p surrealdb-core --precise 2.1.0 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for surrealdb, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update surrealdb to 2.1.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-h4f5-h82v-5w4r 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-h4f5-h82v-5w4r can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-h4f5-h82v-5w4r. 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-h4f5-h82v-5w4r in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-h4f5-h82v-5w4r across crates.io dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.