Summary
Impact
A malicious SAML payload can require transforms that consume significant system resources to process, thereby resulting in reduced or denied service. This would be an effective way to perform a denial-of-service attack.
Crafted input forces the application to consume excessive CPU, memory, or other resources, degrading or denying service. Typical impact: denial of service.
CVE-2021-39171 has a CVSS score of 5.3 (Medium). 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 (3.1.0); upgrading removes the vulnerable code path.
Affected versions
Security releases
Kodem intelligence
Severity tells you how bad this could be in the worst case. It does not tell you whether you are exposed. Exploitability and impact are functions of runtime truth: whether the vulnerable code is present, reachable, and actually executes in your application. A vulnerable package can sit in your dependency tree and never run.
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. Kodem's runtime-powered SCA identifies whether this CVE is reachable in your applications.
Remediation advice
This has been resolved in version 3.1.0. The resolution is to limit the number of allowable transforms to 2.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What is CVE-2021-39171? CVE-2021-39171 is a medium-severity uncontrolled resource consumption vulnerability in passport-saml (npm), affecting versions < 3.1.0. It is fixed in 3.1.0. Crafted input forces the application to consume excessive CPU, memory, or other resources, degrading or denying service.
- How severe is CVE-2021-39171? CVE-2021-39171 has a CVSS score of 5.3 (Medium). 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.
- Which versions of passport-saml are affected by CVE-2021-39171? passport-saml (npm) versions < 3.1.0 is affected.
- Is there a fix for CVE-2021-39171? Yes. CVE-2021-39171 is fixed in 3.1.0. Upgrade to this version or later.
- Is CVE-2021-39171 exploitable, and should I be worried? Whether CVE-2021-39171 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
- What actually determines whether CVE-2021-39171 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.
- How do I fix CVE-2021-39171? Upgrade
passport-samlto 3.1.0 or later.