Summary
Comrak vulnerable to production of excessive output when parsing Markdown (GHSL-2023-048)
Workarounds
n/a
References
Impact
comrak is vulnerable to the upstream cmark issue, "Issue revealed by fuzzer". A large number of references in a markdown document can trigger an overly large response.
GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W 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 (0.17.0); 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.
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0.17.0 contains https://github.com/kivikakk/comrak/commit/70f97f3ea4eae30ffbd1b94c764a3de2f1c41d2a, which limits reference output to a 100Kb maximum.
Frequently Asked Questions
- What is GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W? GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W is a medium-severity security vulnerability in comrak (rust), affecting versions < 0.17.0. It is fixed in 0.17.0.
- How severe is GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W? GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W 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 comrak are affected by GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W? comrak (rust) versions < 0.17.0 is affected.
- Is there a fix for GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W? Yes. GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W is fixed in 0.17.0. Upgrade to this version or later.
- Is GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W exploitable, and should I be worried? Whether GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W 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 GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W 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 GHSA-XXMQ-4VPH-956W? Upgrade
comrakto 0.17.0 or later.