GHSA-r6qf-8968-wj9q is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.3) CWE-863 vulnerability in openclaw. A fix is available for openclaw — see the affected versions and patch details below.
OpenClaw: system.run wrapper-depth boundary could skip shell approval gating
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-r6qf-8968-wj9q.
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-r6qf-8968-wj9q 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 379,145 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.
openclawnpmDescription
OpenClaw's system.run dispatch-wrapper handling applied different depth-boundary rules to shell-wrapper approval detection and execution planning.
With exactly four transparent dispatch wrappers such as repeated env invocations before /bin/sh -c, the approval classifier could stop treating the command as a shell wrapper at the depth boundary while execution planning still unwrapped through to the shell payload. In security=allowlist mode, that mismatch could skip the expected approval-required path for the shell wrapper invocation.
Latest published npm version: 2026.3.2
Fixed on main on March 7, 2026 in 2fc95a7cfc1eb9306356510b0251b6d51fb1c0b0 by keeping shell-wrapper classification active at the configured dispatch depth boundary and only failing closed beyond that boundary. This aligns approval gating with the execution plan. Legitimate shallow dispatch-wrapper usage continues to work.
Affected Packages / Versions
- Package:
openclaw(npm) - Affected versions:
<= 2026.3.2 - Patched version:
>= 2026.3.7
Fix Commit(s)
2fc95a7cfc1eb9306356510b0251b6d51fb1c0b0
Release Process Note
npm 2026.3.7 was published on March 8, 2026. This advisory is fixed in the released package.
Thanks @tdjackey for reporting.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | openclaw | all versions | 2026.3.7npm install openclaw@2026.3.7 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for openclaw, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update openclaw to 2026.3.7 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-r6qf-8968-wj9q 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-r6qf-8968-wj9q can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-r6qf-8968-wj9q. 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-r6qf-8968-wj9q in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-r6qf-8968-wj9q across npm dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.