# CVE-2024-28176: jose vulnerable to resource exhaustion via specifically crafted JWE with compressed plaintext

> Attackers can cause resource exhaustion via crafted JWE tokens, leading to denial of service in applications using the jose library.

- **Severity:** Medium 4.9 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** An administrator
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 9 Mar 2024
- **Updated:** 13 Feb 2025
- **Also known as:** CLSA-2026-1792163458, GHSA-hhhv-q57g-882q, UBUNTU-CVE-2024-28176

## What is CVE-2024-28176?

CVE-2024-28176 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Fedoraproject Fedora, published on 9 Mar 2024. An attacker needs administrator access to exploit it, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

jose is JavaScript module for JSON Object Signing and Encryption, providing support for JSON Web Tokens (JWT), JSON Web Signature (JWS), JSON Web Encryption (JWE), JSON Web Key (JWK), JSON Web Key Set (JWKS), and more. A vulnerability has 
 been identified in the JSON Web Encryption (JWE) decryption interfaces, specifically related to the support for decompressing plaintext after its decryption. Under certain conditions it is possible to have the user's environment consume unreasonable amount of CPU time or memory during JWE Decryption operations. This issue has been patched in versions 2.0.7 and 4.15.5.

Weakness: CWE-400 (Uncontrolled Resource Consumption)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2024-28176?

8 open source packages ship an affected version, including jose, jose-node-cjs-runtime and jose-node-esm-runtime. It affects 2 products.


| Package | Ecosystem | Affected | Fixed in |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `jose` | npm | All versions | 2.0.7 |
| `jose` | npm | All versions | 2.0.7 |
| `jose` | npm | From 3.0.0 | 4.15.5 |
| `jose` | npm | From 3.0.0 | 4.15.5 |
| `jose-node-cjs-runtime` | npm | All versions | 4.15.5 |
| `jose-node-cjs-runtime` | npm | All versions | 4.15.5 |
| `jose-node-esm-runtime` | npm | All versions | 4.15.5 |
| `jose-node-esm-runtime` | npm | All versions | 4.15.5 |

Products: Fedoraproject Fedora, Jose Project Jose.

## How do I fix CVE-2024-28176?

Upgrade jose to a fixed version for your release line: 2.0.7 or 4.15.5.

## Is CVE-2024-28176 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2024-28176 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Fedoraproject Fedora

- [CVE-2024-4577](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-4577/): PHP-CGI OS Command Injection (critical 9.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2021-39226](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-39226/): Grafana Authentication Bypass (critical 9.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2019-5544](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2019-5544/): VMware ESXi and Horizon DaaS OpenSLP Heap-Based Buffer Overflow (critical 9.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2024-4947](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-4947/): Google Chromium V8 Type Confusion (critical 9.6, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2024-4671](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-4671/): Google Chromium Visuals Use-After-Free (critical 9.6, exploited in the wild)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2024-28176 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2024-28176 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Fedoraproject Fedora, published on 9 Mar 2024. An attacker needs administrator access to exploit it, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2024-28176 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected packages and fixed versions:
- jose (npm): affected all versions; fixed in 2.0.7
- jose (npm): affected all versions; fixed in 2.0.7
- jose (npm): affected from 3.0.0; fixed in 4.15.5
- jose (npm): affected from 3.0.0; fixed in 4.15.5
- jose-node-cjs-runtime (npm): affected all versions; fixed in 4.15.5
- jose-node-cjs-runtime (npm): affected all versions; fixed in 4.15.5
- jose-node-esm-runtime (npm): affected all versions; fixed in 4.15.5
- jose-node-esm-runtime (npm): affected all versions; fixed in 4.15.5

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-28176/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-28176/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2024-28176
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-28176
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2024-28176

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-28176/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.