GHSA-m974-xj4j-7qv5
HIGHBoxo bitswap/server: DOS unbounded persistent memory leak
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.
Blast Radius
github.com/ipfs/go-libipfs🐹github.com/ipfs/go-libipfsReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Go packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Impact
An attacker is able allocate arbitrarily many bytes in the Bitswap server by sending many WANT_BLOCK and or WANT_HAVE requests which are queued in an unbounded queue, with allocations that persist even if the connection is closed.
This affects users accepting untrusted connections with the Bitswap server, this also affects users using the old API stubs at github.com/ipfs/boxo/bitswap because it transitively uses github.com/ipfs/boxo/bitswap/server.
We have renamed go-libipfs to boxo; this document uses both terms interchangeably. The version numbers for both are applicable, as they share the same historical timeline.
Remediation
Apply one of:
- Update
boxotov0.6.0or later - Update
boxotov0.4.1Note thatv0.5.0is NOT safe,v0.4.1is a backport of thev0.6.0security fixes on top ofv0.4.0.
Mitigations
- The server now limits how many wantlist entries per peer it knows.
The
MaxQueuedWantlistEntriesPerPeeroption allows configuring how many wantlist entries the server remembers; if a peer sends a wantlist bigger than this (including a sum of multiple delta updates) the server will truncate the wantlist to the match the limit. This defaults to1024entries per peer. - The server now properly clears state about peers when they disconnect.
Peer state is more lazily allocated (only when a wantlist is received in the first place) and is properly cleared when the
PeerDisconnectedcallback is received. - The server now ignores CIDs above some size.
Clients were able to send any CID as long as the total protobuf message were bellow the 4MiB limit. This is allowed to allocate lots of memory with very little entries.
This can be configured using the
MaxCidSizeoption and defaults to168 bytes. - The server now closes the connection if an inline CID is requested (either as
WANT_*orCANCEL). The attack were more effective if done with CIDs that are present in target's blockstore, this is because this will push longer-lasting jobs on some priority queue. Since inline CID are literal data (instead of hashes of data), everyone always "has" any inline CID (since instead of loading the data from disk, it can be extracted from the CID). It makes no sense for anyone to ever ask you about an inline CID since they could also just parse it themselves. Thus, as a defensive measure, we kill the connection with peers that ask about an inline CID.
Vulnerable symbols
github.com/ipfs/go-libipfs/bitswap/server/internal/decision.(*Engine).MessageReceivedgithub.com/ipfs/go-libipfs/bitswap/server/internal/decision.(*Engine).NotifyNewBlocksgithub.com/ipfs/go-libipfs/bitswap/server/internal/decision.(*Engine).findOrCreategithub.com/ipfs/go-libipfs/bitswap/server/internal/decision.(*Engine).PeerConnected
Patches
- https://github.com/ipfs/boxo/commit/9cb5cb54d40b57084d1221ba83b9e6bb3fcc3197 (mitigations 1 and 2)
- https://github.com/ipfs/boxo/commit/62cbac40b96f49e39cd7fedc77ee6b56adce4916 (mitigations 3 and 4)
- https://github.com/ipfs/boxo/commit/baa748b682fabb21a4c1f7628a8af348d4645974 (tests)
Workarounds
If you are using the stubs at github.com/ipfs/go-libipfs/bitswap and not taking advantage of the features provided by the server, refactoring your code to use the new split API will allow you to run in a client-only mode using: github.com/ipfs/boxo/bitswap/client.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐹Go | github.com/ipfs/go-libipfs | ≥ 0.5.0&&< 0.6.0 | 0.6.0 |
| 🐹Go | github.com/ipfs/go-libipfs | all versions | 0.4.1 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for github.com/ipfs/go-libipfs. 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 github.com/ipfs/go-libipfs to 0.6.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-m974-xj4j-7qv5 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-m974-xj4j-7qv5 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-m974-xj4j-7qv5. 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-m974-xj4j-7qv5 in your dependencies?
O3 detects GHSA-m974-xj4j-7qv5 across Go dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.