GHSA-qrgf-9gpc-vrxw is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.3) Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability in @fastify/csrf-protection. A fix is available for @fastify/csrf-protection — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Bypass of CSRF protection in the presence of predictable userInfo
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-qrgf-9gpc-vrxw.
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-qrgf-9gpc-vrxw 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% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
How broadly this vulnerability is actually deployed: weekly install volume shows current usage, and reverse-dependency count shows how many other packages break if it stays unpatched.
@fastify/csrf-protectionnpmDescription
Description
The CSRF protection enforced by the @fastify/csrf-protection library in combination with @fastify/cookie can be bypassed from network and same-site attackers under certain conditions.
@fastify/csrf-protection supports an optional userInfo parameter that binds the CSRF token to the user. This parameter has been introduced to prevent cookie-tossing attacks as a fix for CVE-2021-29624. Whenever userInfo parameter is missing, or its value can be predicted for the target user account, network and same-site attackers can 1. fixate a _csrf cookie in the victim's browser, and 2. forge CSRF tokens that are valid for the victim's session. This allows attackers to bypass the CSRF protection mechanism.
As a fix, @fastify/csrf-protection starting from version 6.3.0 (and v4.1.0) includes a server-defined secret hmacKey that cryptographically binds the CSRF token to the value of the _csrf cookie and the userInfo parameter, making tokens non-spoofable by attackers. This protection is effective as long as the userInfo parameter is unique for each user.
Patches
This is patched in version 6.3.0 and v4.1.0.
Workarounds
As a workaround, developers can use a random, non-predictable userInfo parameter for each user.
Credits
- Pedro Adão (@pedromigueladao), Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon
- Marco Squarcina (@lavish), Security & Privacy Research Unit, TU Wien
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | @fastify/csrf-protection | all versions | 4.1.0npm install @fastify/csrf-protection@4.1.0 |
| 📦npm | @fastify/csrf-protection | ≥ 5.0.0&&< 6.3.0 | 6.3.0npm install @fastify/csrf-protection@6.3.0 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for @fastify/csrf-protection, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update @fastify/csrf-protection to 4.1.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-qrgf-9gpc-vrxw 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-qrgf-9gpc-vrxw can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-qrgf-9gpc-vrxw. 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-qrgf-9gpc-vrxw in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-qrgf-9gpc-vrxw across npm dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.