How severe is GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf?

GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf has a CVSS score of 8.6/10, rated HIGH. Immediate patching is strongly recommended.

Which packages are affected by GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf?

GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf affects the following packages: starcitizentools/short-description (Packagist). Ecosystems affected: Packagist.

How do I fix GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf?

Update starcitizentools/short-description to 4.0.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf is resolved across your whole dependency graph.

How do I detect GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf in my Packagist dependencies?

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

How do I mitigate GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf if there is no patch (or I can't update yet)?

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 does O3 Security protect against GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf?

O3 pinpoints whether GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf is reachable in your code and exactly where to fix it, then blocks exploitation in production at runtime until the patched version is deployed.

Is GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf actively exploited in the wild?

No public exploit code has been indexed for GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf yet. This does not mean the vulnerability cannot be exploited — absence of public exploits does not imply safety. Apply the recommended fix and use O3 Security to monitor your exposure.

What is the EPSS score for GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf?

GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf has an EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) score of 0.3%, placing it in the 20th percentile of all CVEs. EPSS is maintained by FIRST.org and estimates the probability that a vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days. This score indicates relatively lower exploitation probability, though the CVSS severity should still guide your patching priority.

What type of vulnerability is GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf?

GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf is classified as Cross-site Scripting (XSS) (CWE-79). This weakness type describe the underlying flaw category, which helps determine the potential impact and the right class of mitigation. This is a high-impact weakness class that often enables remote code execution or data exposure.

When was GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf published, and has it been updated?

GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf was published on July 3, 2025 and was last updated on July 3, 2025. Advisory data evolves as severity scores, affected ranges, and exploit intelligence are revised — always check the latest version of the advisory before acting.

🐘 Packagist

GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf

HIGH

Citizen Short Description stored XSS vulnerability through wikitext

Also known asCVE-2025-53369

Published

Jul 3, 2025

Updated

Jul 3, 2025

Affected

1 pkg

Patched

1 / 1

Exploits

None indexed

EPSS Exploitation Probability

via FIRST.org ↗

0.3%probability of exploitation in next 30 days

Lower Risk20th percentile-0.07%

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

1 pkg affected

🐘starcitizentools/short-description

Real-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Packagist packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.

Description

Summary

Short descriptions are not properly sanitized by the ShortDescription before being inserted as HTML using mw.util.addSubtitle, allowing any user to insert arbitrary HTML into the DOM by editing a page.

Details

The description provided by the user via the {{SHORTDESC:}} parser function is insufficiently sanitized by the sanitize() function, as html entities are decoded: https://github.com/StarCitizenTools/mediawiki-extensions-ShortDescription/blob/7244b1e8b5cb6dbd7e546c5be7fed8a56e33d065/includes/Hooks/ParserHooks.php#L147-L159 Via JS, the short description is then passed to mw.util.addSubtitle, which inserts it as raw HTML: https://github.com/StarCitizenTools/mediawiki-extensions-ShortDescription/blob/7244b1e8b5cb6dbd7e546c5be7fed8a56e33d065/modules/ext.shortDescription.js#L8 https://github.com/wikimedia/mediawiki/blob/96372101b3c579d9992e8a31a3ccd90a937cac47/resources/src/mediawiki.util/util.js#L552-L563

PoC

Enable ShortDescription
Make sure $wgShortDescriptionEnableTagline is set to true (this is the default)
Create a page and insert the following wikitext: {{SHORTDESC:<img src="" onerror="alert('shortdescription xss')">}}
Visit the page

Impact

Arbitrary HTML can be inserted into the DOM by any user, allowing for JavaScript to be executed.

Affected Packages

1 total 1 fixed

Ecosystem	Package	Vulnerable range	Fix
🐘Packagist	`starcitizentools/short-description`	≥ 4.0.0&&< 4.0.1	4.0.1

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency

Detect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for starcitizentools/short-description. 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 starcitizentools/short-description to 4.0.1 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf 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-p85q-mww9-gwqf 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-p85q-mww9-gwqf. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.

Frequently Asked Questions

### Summary Short descriptions are not properly sanitized by the ShortDescription before being inserted as HTML using `mw.util.addSubtitle`, allowing any user to insert arbitrary HTML into the DOM by editing a page. ### Details The description provided by the user via the `{{SHORTDESC:}}` parser function is insufficiently sanitized by the `sanitize()` function, as html entities are decoded: https://github.com/StarCitizenTools/mediawiki-extensions-ShortDescription/blob/7244b1e8b5cb6dbd7e546c5be7fed8a56e33d065/includes/Hooks/ParserHooks.php#L147-L159 Via JS, the short description is then passed

O3 Security · Impact-Aware SCA

Is GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf in your dependencies?

O3 detects GHSA-p85q-mww9-gwqf across Packagist dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.

Scan my dependencies How O3 SCA works