GHSA-p7j4-jwjf-5x9w is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.3) CWE-440 vulnerability in llama-index-readers-papers. A fix is available for llama-index-readers-papers — see the affected versions and patch details below.
LlamaIndex vulnerability in ArxivReader class can cause MD5 hash collisions
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.
- CISA assesses this as automatable — exploitation doesn’t require manual, per-target effort, which raises the odds of mass scanning and opportunistic attacks.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for GHSA-p7j4-jwjf-5x9w.
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-p7j4-jwjf-5x9w 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
llama-index-readers-papersReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects PyPI packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
A vulnerability in the ArxivReader class of the run-llama/llama_index repository allows for MD5 hash collisions when generating filenames for downloaded papers. This can lead to data loss as papers with identical titles but different contents may overwrite each other, preventing some papers from being processed for AI model training. The issue is resolved in llama-index-readers-papers version 0.3.1 (in llama-index 0.12.28).
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐍PyPI | llama-index-readers-papers | all versions | 0.3.1pip install --upgrade 'llama-index-readers-papers==0.3.1' |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for llama-index-readers-papers, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update llama-index-readers-papers to 0.3.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-p7j4-jwjf-5x9w 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-p7j4-jwjf-5x9w can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-p7j4-jwjf-5x9w. 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-p7j4-jwjf-5x9w in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-p7j4-jwjf-5x9w across PyPI dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.