REXML ReDoS vulnerability
### Impact The REXML gem before 3.3.9 has a ReDoS vulnerability when it parses an XML that has many digits between `&#` and `x...;` in a hex numeric character reference (`&#x...;`). This does not happen with Ruby 3.2 or later. Ruby 3.1 is the only affected maintained Ruby. Note that Ruby 3.1 will reach EOL on 2025-03. ### Patches The REXML gem 3.3.9 or later include the patch to fix the vulnerability. ### Workarounds Use Ruby 3.2 or later instead of Ruby 3.1. ### References * https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/news/2024/10/28/redos-rexml-cve-2024-49761/: An announce on www.ruby-lang.org
describes (2)
Related CVEs.
| ID | severity | exploitable | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CVE-2025-10990US | — | — | ||
A flaw was found in REXML. A remote attacker could exploit inefficient regular expression (regex) parsing when processing hex numeric character references (&#x...;) in XML document… | ||||
| CVE-2024-49761US | high7.5 | — | ||
REXML is an XML toolkit for Ruby. The REXML gem before 3.3.9 has a ReDoS vulnerability when it parses an XML that has many digits between &# and x...; in a hex numeric character re… | ||||
references
External citations — patches, advisories, analysis.
- https://github.com/ruby/rexmlPACKAGE
- https://github.com/ruby/rexml/commit/ce59f2eb1aeb371fe1643414f06618dbe031979fWEB
- https://github.com/ruby/rexml/security/advisories/GHSA-2rxp-v6pw-ch6mWEB
- https://github.com/rubysec/ruby-advisory-db/blob/master/gems/rexml/CVE-2024-49761.ymlWEB
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2025/01/msg00011.htmlWEB
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-49761ADVISORY
- https://security.netapp.com/advisory/ntap-20241227-0004WEB
- https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/news/2024/10/28/redos-rexml-cve-2024-49761WEB
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