Vulnerability · Published May 13, 2026 · Assigned by GitHub_M

CVE-2026-45740protobufjs: Denial of Service via unbounded recursive JSON descriptor expansion

Medium 5.3

In plain English

A medium-severity security flaw in protobuf.js from protobufjs. There are no confirmed reports of exploitation so far. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 0.3% (higher than 18% of all known vulnerabilities). Fixed versions are available - upgrade the affected package.

Severity (CVSS 3.1)5.3Medium

Exploit odds (30 days)0.3%top 81.8% of all CVEs

Exploited in the wildNo reportsCISA SSVC: none

Attack toolingNoneno public tooling known

Official description

protobufjs compiles protobuf definitions into JavaScript (JS) functions. Prior to 7.5.8 and 8.2.0, protobufjs could recurse without a depth limit while expanding nested JSON descriptors through Root.fromJSON() and Namespace.addJSON(). A crafted JSON descriptor with deeply nested namespace definitions could cause the JavaScript call stack to be exhausted during descriptor loading. This vulnerability is fixed in 7.5.8 and 8.2.0.

Affected packages & fixed versions

Ecosystem	Package	Fixed in	Advisory
npm	protobufjs	7.5.8	GHSA-jggg-4jg4-v7c6
npm	protobufjs	8.2.0	GHSA-jggg-4jg4-v7c6

Affected products (as reported)

Vendor	Product	Versions
protobufjs	protobuf.js	< 7.5.8>= 8.0.0, < 8.2.0

Weakness: CWE-674 · Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L

References

https://github.com/protobufjs/protobuf.js/security/advisories/GHSA-jggg-4jg4-v7c6 x_refsource_CONFIRM