CVE-2022-34668

CVSS Score = 9.8

AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Workarounds

No workarounds available.

Additional information

Issue Found by: Oliver Sellwood (Nintorac) and Elias Hohl

NVFLARE contains a vulnerability where deserialization of Untrusted Data due to Pickle usage may allow an unprivileged network attacker to cause Remote Code Execution, Denial Of Service, and Impact to both Confidentiality and Integrity.

All versions before 2.1.4 are affected.

Untrusted serialized data is processed by a deserializer that can instantiate arbitrary objects or execute code as a side effect. Typical impact: arbitrary code execution or logic abuse.

CVE-2022-34668 has a CVSS score of 9.8 (Critical). 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 (2.1.4); upgrading removes the vulnerable code path.

Kodem intelligence

The patch is included in nvflare==2.1.4
This new version uses MessagePack instead of Pickle to do serialization and deserialization.

Some object serializations supported by Pickle are not supported by MessagePack. We have provided out of box support for some built-in NVFLARE objects. For object serializations unsupported by MessagePack, the user will need to convert the objects to numpy or bytes before sending over to remote machines. The list of supported object types are listed in https://github.com/NVIDIA/NVFlare/blob/2.1/nvflare/fuel/utils/fobs/README.rst

1. What is CVE-2022-34668? CVE-2022-34668 is a critical-severity insecure deserialization vulnerability in nvflare (pip), affecting versions < 2.1.4. It is fixed in 2.1.4. Untrusted serialized data is processed by a deserializer that can instantiate arbitrary objects or execute code as a side effect.
2. How severe is CVE-2022-34668? CVE-2022-34668 has a CVSS score of 9.8 (Critical). 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 nvflare are affected by CVE-2022-34668? nvflare (pip) versions < 2.1.4 is affected.
4. Is there a fix for CVE-2022-34668? Yes. CVE-2022-34668 is fixed in 2.1.4. Upgrade to this version or later.
5. Is CVE-2022-34668 exploitable, and should I be worried? Whether CVE-2022-34668 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-2022-34668 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-2022-34668? Upgrade nvflare to 2.1.4 or later.

Other vulnerabilities in nvflare