GHSA-qpg2-vx7j-3869 — reportlab
CRITICALGHSA-qpg2-vx7j-3869 is a critical-severity (CVSS 9.8) CWE-91 vulnerability in reportlab. 1 public exploit reference exists, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for reportlab — see the affected versions and patch details below.
XML Injection in ReportLab
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation observed yet
- CISA assesses this as automatable — exploitation doesn’t require manual, per-target effort, which raises the odds of mass scanning and opportunistic attacks.
- A successful exploit gives an attacker total control of the affected component, not partial access.
- 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-qpg2-vx7j-3869.
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-qpg2-vx7j-3869 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 377,166 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the 10–50% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
reportlabReal-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
ReportLab through 3.5.26 allows remote code execution because of toColor(eval(arg)) in colors.py, as demonstrated by a crafted XML document with '<span color="' followed by arbitrary Python code.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐍PyPI | reportlab | all versions | 3.5.28pip install --upgrade 'reportlab==3.5.28' |
Research use only. For defensive security, authorized penetration testing, and academic research only. Never execute exploit code against systems without explicit written authorization.
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for reportlab, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update reportlab to 3.5.28 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-qpg2-vx7j-3869 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-qpg2-vx7j-3869 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-qpg2-vx7j-3869. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Fixing This On Your OS
If you run this on a Linux distribution, patch through your package manager against the distro's own security advisory below — it tracks the exact backported fix for your release, which can ship on a different timeline (and sometimes a different severity) than the upstream project.
This vulnerability will not be fixed in Red Hat Quay because it only affects a non-supported feature which is disabled behind a feature flag.
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 | python-reportlab-0:2.3-3.el6_10.1 | RHSA-2020:0197 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 | python-reportlab-0:2.5-9.el7_7.1 | RHSA-2020:0195 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | python-reportlab-0:3.4.0-6.el8_1.2 | RHSA-2020:0201 |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.0 Update Services for SAP Solutions | python-reportlab-0:3.4.0-6.el8_0.2 | RHSA-2020:0230 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is GHSA-qpg2-vx7j-3869 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-qpg2-vx7j-3869 across PyPI dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.