CVE-2021-32804

Publication date 3 August 2021

Last updated 24 July 2024


Ubuntu priority

Cvss 3 Severity Score

8.1 · High

Score breakdown

The npm package “tar” (aka node-tar) before versions 6.1.1, 5.0.6, 4.4.14, and 3.3.2 has a arbitrary File Creation/Overwrite vulnerability due to insufficient absolute path sanitization. node-tar aims to prevent extraction of absolute file paths by turning absolute paths into relative paths when the `preservePaths` flag is not set to `true`. This is achieved by stripping the absolute path root from any absolute file paths contained in a tar file. For example `/home/user/.bashrc` would turn into `home/user/.bashrc`. This logic was insufficient when file paths contained repeated path roots such as `////home/user/.bashrc`. `node-tar` would only strip a single path root from such paths. When given an absolute file path with repeating path roots, the resulting path (e.g. `///home/user/.bashrc`) would still resolve to an absolute path, thus allowing arbitrary file creation and overwrite. This issue was addressed in releases 3.2.2, 4.4.14, 5.0.6 and 6.1.1. Users may work around this vulnerability without upgrading by creating a custom `onentry` method which sanitizes the `entry.path` or a `filter` method which removes entries with absolute paths. See referenced GitHub Advisory for details. Be aware of CVE-2021-32803 which fixes a similar bug in later versions of tar.

Status

Package Ubuntu Release Status
node-tar 24.10 oracular
Needs evaluation
24.04 LTS noble
Needs evaluation
23.10 mantic Ignored end of life, was needs-triage
23.04 lunar Ignored end of life, was needs-triage
22.10 kinetic Ignored end of life, was needs-triage
22.04 LTS jammy
Needs evaluation
21.10 impish Ignored end of life
21.04 hirsute Ignored end of life
20.04 LTS focal
Needs evaluation
18.04 LTS bionic
Needs evaluation
16.04 LTS xenial
Needs evaluation
14.04 LTS trusty Ignored end of ESM support, was needs-triage

Severity score breakdown

Parameter Value
Base score 8.1 · High
Attack vector Network
Attack complexity Low
Privileges required None
User interaction Required
Scope Unchanged
Confidentiality None
Integrity impact High
Availability impact High
Vector CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:H