CVE-2021-22880

Active Record subject to Regular Expression Denial-of-Service (ReDoS)

The PostgreSQL adapter in Active Record before 6.1.2.1, 6.0.3.5, 5.2.4.5 suffers from a regular expression denial of service (REDoS) vulnerability. Carefully crafted input can cause the input validation in the money type of the PostgreSQL adapter in Active Record to spend too much time in a regular expression, resulting in the potential for a DoS attack. This only impacts Rails applications that are using PostgreSQL along with money type columns that take user input.

Crafted input forces the application to consume excessive CPU, memory, or other resources, degrading or denying service. Typical impact: denial of service.

CVE-2021-22880 has a CVSS score of 7.5 (High). The vector is network-reachable, no privileges required, and no user interaction. A CVSS score reflects the worst-case severity of the vulnerability, not your specific exposure. Whether this affects your application depends on whether the vulnerable code is present and reachable in your environment. A fixed version is available (5.2.4.5, 6.0.3.5, 6.1.2.1); upgrading removes the vulnerable code path.

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1. What is CVE-2021-22880? CVE-2021-22880 is a high-severity uncontrolled resource consumption vulnerability in activerecord (rubygems), affecting versions >= 5.0.0, <= 5.2.4.4. It is fixed in 5.2.4.5, 6.0.3.5, 6.1.2.1. Crafted input forces the application to consume excessive CPU, memory, or other resources, degrading or denying service.
2. How severe is CVE-2021-22880? CVE-2021-22880 has a CVSS score of 7.5 (High). This score reflects the worst-case severity of the vulnerability, not your specific exposure. Whether it represents real risk in your environment depends on whether the vulnerable code is present and reachable.
3. Which versions of activerecord are affected by CVE-2021-22880? activerecord (rubygems) versions >= 5.0.0, <= 5.2.4.4 is affected.
4. Is there a fix for CVE-2021-22880? Yes. CVE-2021-22880 is fixed in 5.2.4.5, 6.0.3.5, 6.1.2.1. Upgrade to this version or later.
5. Is CVE-2021-22880 exploitable, and should I be worried? Whether CVE-2021-22880 is exploitable in your environment depends on whether the vulnerable code is present and reachable. A CVSS score is a worst-case rating; it does not account for your specific deployment, configuration, or usage patterns. Kodem, an Intelligent Application Security platform, uses runtime intelligence to show which vulnerabilities actually execute in production, so you can focus on the ones that represent real risk. Get a demo
6. What actually determines whether CVE-2021-22880 is exploitable, and how bad it is? Exploitability and impact are not fixed properties of a CVE. They depend on runtime truth: whether the vulnerable code is present, reachable, and actually executes in your application. A high CVSS score on a dependency that never runs is not the same as real risk. Kodem, an Intelligent Application Security platform, uses runtime intelligence to reveal which vulnerabilities actually execute in production, so teams prioritize the ones that genuinely matter.
7. How do I fix CVE-2021-22880?
   • Upgrade activerecord to 5.2.4.5 or later
   • Upgrade activerecord to 6.0.3.5 or later
   • Upgrade activerecord to 6.1.2.1 or later

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