GHSA-r3jf-hm7q-qfw5 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) CWE-770 vulnerability in mantisbt/mantisbt. A fix is available for mantisbt/mantisbt — see the affected versions and patch details below.
MantisBT Vulnerable to Denial-of-Service (DoS) via Excessive Note Length
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-r3jf-hm7q-qfw5.
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-r3jf-hm7q-qfw5 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
mantisbt/mantisbtReal-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
A lack of server-side validation for note length in MantisBT allows attackers to permanently corrupt issue activity logs by submitting extremely long notes (tested with 4,788,761 characters). Once such a note is added:
Impact
- The entire activity stream becomes unviewable (UI fails to render).
- New notes cannot be displayed, effectively breaking all future collaboration on the issue.
Patches
Fixed in 2.27.2.
Workarounds
None
Credits
Thanks to Mazen Mahmoud (@TheAmazeng) for reporting the vulnerability.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐘Packagist | mantisbt/mantisbt | all versions | 2.27.2composer require mantisbt/mantisbt:^2.27.2 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for mantisbt/mantisbt, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update mantisbt/mantisbt to 2.27.2 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-r3jf-hm7q-qfw5 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-r3jf-hm7q-qfw5 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-r3jf-hm7q-qfw5. 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-r3jf-hm7q-qfw5 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-r3jf-hm7q-qfw5 across Packagist dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.