GHSA-xh29-r2w5-wx8m is a high-severity (CVSS 8.2) CWE-241 vulnerability in nokogiri. 1 public exploit reference exists, so weaponization risk is real. A fix is available for nokogiri — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Nokogiri Improperly Handles Unexpected Data Type
Exploitation Status
Proof-of-concept exploit code exists
- CISA’s SSVC triage found public proof-of-concept exploit code for this CVE, though no confirmed active exploitation.
- CISA assesses this as automatable — exploitation doesn’t require manual, per-target effort, which raises the odds of mass scanning and opportunistic attacks.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for GHSA-xh29-r2w5-wx8m.
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-xh29-r2w5-wx8m 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
nokogiriReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects RubyGems packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Summary
Nokogiri < v1.13.6 does not type-check all inputs into the XML and HTML4 SAX parsers. For CRuby users, this may allow specially crafted untrusted inputs to cause illegal memory access errors (segfault) or reads from unrelated memory.
Severity
The Nokogiri maintainers have evaluated this as High 8.2 (CVSS3.1).
Mitigation
CRuby users should upgrade to Nokogiri >= 1.13.6.
JRuby users are not affected.
Workarounds
To avoid this vulnerability in affected applications, ensure the untrusted input is a String by calling #to_s or equivalent.
Credit
This vulnerability was responsibly reported by @agustingianni and the Github Security Lab.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 💎RubyGems | nokogiri | all versions | 1.13.6bundle update nokogiri --conservative |
Research use only. For defensive security, authorized penetration testing, and academic research only. Never execute exploit code against systems without explicit written authorization.
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for nokogiri, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update nokogiri to 1.13.6 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms GHSA-xh29-r2w5-wx8m 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-xh29-r2w5-wx8m can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to GHSA-xh29-r2w5-wx8m. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Fixing This On Your OS
If you run this on a Linux distribution, patch through your package manager against the distro's own security advisory below — it tracks the exact backported fix for your release, which can ship on a different timeline (and sometimes a different severity) than the upstream project.
Red Hat Satellite 6.12 and later versions are not affected by this flaw.
| Product | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|
| Red Hat Satellite 6.12 for RHEL 8 | tfm-rubygem-nokogiri-0:1.13.8-1.el8sat | RHSA-2022:8506 |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is GHSA-xh29-r2w5-wx8m in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds GHSA-xh29-r2w5-wx8m across RubyGems dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.