Padding Oracle Attack due to Observable Timing Discrepancy in jose
Summary
| CVE | CVE-2021-29443 |
|---|---|
| State | PUBLISHED |
| Assigner | GitHub_M |
| Source Priority | CVE Program / NVD first with legacy fallback |
| Published | 2021-04-16 18:15:13 UTC |
| Updated | 2026-06-22 03:10:06 UTC |
| Description | jose is an npm library providing a number of cryptographic operations. In vulnerable versions AES_CBC_HMAC_SHA2 Algorithm (A128CBC-HS256, A192CBC-HS384, A256CBC-HS512) decryption would always execute both HMAC tag verification and CBC decryption, if either failed `JWEDecryptionFailed` would be thrown. A possibly observable difference in timing when padding error would occur while decrypting the ciphertext makes a padding oracle and an adversary might be able to make use of that oracle to decrypt data without knowing the decryption key by issuing on average 128*b calls to the padding oracle (where b is the number of bytes in the ciphertext block). All major release versions have had a patch released which ensures the HMAC tag is verified before performing CBC decryption. The fixed versions are `^1.28.1 || ^2.0.5 || >=3.11.4`. Users should upgrade their v1.x dependency to ^1.28.1, their v2.x dependency to ^2.0.5, and their v3.x dependency to ^3.11.4. Thanks to Jason from Microsoft Vulnerability Research (MSVR) for bringing this up and Eva Sarafianou (@esarafianou) for helping to score this advisory. |
Risk And Classification
Primary CVSS: v3.1 5.9 MEDIUM from [email protected]
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
Problem Types: CWE-203 | CWE-203 {"CWE-203":"Observable Discrepancy"}
| Version | Source | Type | Score | Severity | Vector |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3.1 | [email protected] | Primary | 5.9 | MEDIUM | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N |
| 3.1 | [email protected] | Secondary | 5.9 | MEDIUM | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N |
| 3.1 | CNA | DECLARED | 5.9 | MEDIUM | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N |
| 2.0 | [email protected] | Primary | 4.3 | AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N |
CVSS v3.1 Breakdown
Attack Vector
NetworkAttack Complexity
HighPrivileges Required
NoneUser Interaction
NoneScope
UnchangedConfidentiality
HighIntegrity
NoneAvailability
NoneCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
CVSS v2.0 Breakdown
Access Vector
NetworkAccess Complexity
MediumAuthentication
NoneConfidentiality
PartialIntegrity
NoneAvailability
NoneAV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N
NVD Known Affected Configurations (CPE 2.3)
Vendor Declared Affected Products
References
| Reference | Source | Link | Tags |
|---|---|---|---|
| jose - npm | af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108 | www.npmjs.com | Third Party Advisory |
| Padding Oracle Attack due to Observable Timing Discrepancy in jose · Advisory · panva/jose · GitHub | af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108 | github.com | Patch, Third Party Advisory |
| CVE Program record | CVE.ORG | www.cve.org | canonical |
| NVD vulnerability detail | NVD | nvd.nist.gov | canonical, analysis |
No vendor comments have been submitted for this CVE.
Legacy QID Mappings
- 982742 Nodejs (npm) Security Update for jose (GHSA-58f5-hfqc-jgch)