GHSA-vp3h-ghgh-jr7g — nx
Fix: nrwl/nx#36116GHSA-vp3h-ghgh-jr7g is a Path Traversal vulnerability in nx. A fix is available for nx — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Nx: Zip-Slip in the self-hosted remote cache
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-vp3h-ghgh-jr7g.
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.
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.
nxnpm@nx/s3-cachenpm@nx/gcs-cachenpmDescription
Summary
The Nx self-hosted HTTP remote cache extracts downloaded cache artifacts without constraining where files are written. A malicious — or on-path (MITM) — remote cache server can return a crafted tar archive whose entries escape the cache directory and write to arbitrary locations on the machine running Nx. This arbitrary file write can be escalated to remote code execution. The directly exploitable issue is the self-hosted HTTP remote cache.
Affected Packages
[!IMPORTANT] Nx's default local cache and Nx Cloud are NOT affected. The default local cache and Nx Cloud use separate cache retrieval and extraction mechanisms that does not have this vulnerability. Only workspaces that use a self-hosted remote cache (
NX_SELF_HOSTED_REMOTE_CACHE_SERVER,@nx/s3-cache, etc.) are affected.
Two self-hosted cache surfaces are affected:
- The built-in HTTP remote cache (
NX_SELF_HOSTED_REMOTE_CACHE_SERVER, innx) — fixed in the patched release. - The self-hosted cache packages —
@nx/s3-cache,@nx/gcs-cache,@nx/azure-cache,@nx/shared-fs-cache(and their@nx/powerpack-*predecessors) — the same flaw in their own extractor. Deprecated (CVE-2025-36852) and not patched; migrate off (see Remediation).
The shared step that copies cached outputs into the workspace was also part of the exposure and is hardened in the patched nx release.
Remediation
Upgrade to Nx 22.7.7 or 23.0.2 (or later). The patched extractor is a drop-in — no configuration change is required.
If you use the S3, GCS, Azure, or shared-filesystem cache packages
@nx/s3-cache, @nx/gcs-cache, @nx/azure-cache, and @nx/shared-fs-cache (and their @nx/powerpack-* predecessors) are separately versioned packages and are already deprecated (see CVE-2025-36852). Upgrading nx hardens the shared restore step, but it does not fully secure these packages. The remediation for them is to migrate off — to Nx Cloud or the self-hosted OpenAPI/HTTP remote cache — per the deprecation guidance: https://nx.dev/docs/reference/deprecated/self-hosted-cache-packages
Details
When Nx retrieves an artifact from the self-hosted HTTP remote cache, it downloads a gzipped tar archive and extracts it. The extractor joined each untrusted tar entry name directly onto the output directory and unpacked it with tar's unguarded Entry::unpack(), which performs no containment check:
// vulnerable
let path_on_disk = output_dir.join(entry_path); // entry_path is attacker-controlled
fs::create_dir_all(path_on_disk.parent()…)?;
entry.unpack(&path_on_disk)?;
In addition, restore now copies only the declared task outputs (never the whole cache directory), confined to the workspace root; parent directories are realized as real directories so a write can never traverse a symlink; declared outputs that resolve outside the workspace are rejected; and the malformed-input cases return errors instead of panicking.
References
- Fix: https://github.com/nrwl/nx/pull/36116 (merged)
- TLS-verification warning follow-up: https://github.com/nrwl/nx/pull/36132 (merged)
- Vulnerable extractor introduced in Nx 20.8.0: https://github.com/nrwl/nx/pull/30593
Credits
- Lidor B., Novee Security — Reporter
- Assaf Levkovich, Novee Security — Reporter
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 📦npm | nx | ≥ 20.8.0&&< 22.7.7 | 22.7.7npm install nx@22.7.7 |
| 📦npm | @nx/s3-cache | all versions | No fix |
| 📦npm | @nx/gcs-cache | all versions | No fix |
| 📦npm | @nx/azure-cache | all versions | No fix |
| 📦npm | @nx/shared-fs-cache | all versions | No fix |
| 📦npm | @nx/powerpack-s3-cache | all versions | No fix |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for nx, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update nx to 22.7.7 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-vp3h-ghgh-jr7g 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-vp3h-ghgh-jr7g can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-vp3h-ghgh-jr7g. 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-vp3h-ghgh-jr7g in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-vp3h-ghgh-jr7g across npm dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.