GHSA-v2wf-c3j6-wpvw is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) CWE-384 vulnerability in pow. A fix is available for pow — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Session fixation
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-v2wf-c3j6-wpvw 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
powReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Hex packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Impact
The use of Plug.Session in Pow.Plug.Session is susceptible to session fixation attacks if a persistent session store is used for Plug.Session, such as Redis or a database. Cookie store, which is used in most Phoenix apps, doesn't have this vulnerability.
Workarounds
Call Plug.Conn.configure_session(conn, renew: true) periodically and after privilege change. A custom authorization plug can be written where the create/3 method should return the conn only after Plug.Conn.configure_session/2 have been called on it.
References
https://github.com/danschultzer/pow/commit/578ffd3d8bb8e8a26077b644222186b108da474f
https://www.owasp.org/index.php/Session_fixation
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 💧Hex | pow | all versions | 1.0.16mix deps.update pow |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for pow, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update pow to 1.0.16 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-v2wf-c3j6-wpvw 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-v2wf-c3j6-wpvw can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-v2wf-c3j6-wpvw. 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-v2wf-c3j6-wpvw in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-v2wf-c3j6-wpvw across Hex dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.