MarkdownApplication · Gomarkdown

CVE-2023-42821

HIGH · 7.5 CVSS v3.1 Published 2023-09-22
Patch available
A vendor patch is available. No clean upgrade release — apply the published patch.
See remediation →
84/100
Remediation priority · High
Public exploit Remotely reachable No privileges Zero-click Patch available

Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.

NVD · unedited
The package `github.com/gomarkdown/markdown` is a Go library for parsing Markdown text and rendering as HTML. Prior to pseudoversion `0.0.0-20230922105210-14b16010c2ee`, which corresponds with commit `14b16010c2ee7ff33a940a541d993bd043a88940`, parsing malformed markdown input with parser that uses parser.Mmark extension could result in out-of-bounds read vulnerability. To exploit the vulnerability, parser needs to have `parser.Mmark` extension set. The panic occurs inside the `citation.go` file on the line 69 when the parser tries to access the element past its length. This can result in a denial of service. Commit `14b16010c2ee7ff33a940a541d993bd043a88940`/pseudoversion `0.0.0-20230922105210-14b16010c2ee` contains a patch for this issue.

Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.

dbcve analysis
How this class of weakness works · CWE-125

The code reads past the end (or before the start) of a buffer, returning memory that was never meant to be exposed. Attackers use it to leak secrets like keys or to defeat memory-protection defences. Remediation is validating indices and lengths before every read.

General guidance for the out-of-bounds read class — the official description and references above are authoritative for this specific CVE. Want a bespoke review and a reviewed fix? Ask our team →

Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.

NVD · CPE data
MarkdownApplication
Affected:all versions

CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.

From the vector
Attack vector
Network
Complexity
Low
Privileges
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.

dbcve · scoped
Patch available Apply the vendor patch
Vendor patch github.com →
Recommended fix High confidence

Upgrade to at least pseudoversion 0.0.0-20230922105210-14b16010c2ee or later

  1. Run 'go get github.com/gomarkdown/[email protected]' to upgrade to the fixed pseudoversion, or
  2. Run 'go get github.com/gomarkdown/markdown@latest' to get the latest version which should include this fix
  3. Run 'go mod tidy' to update go.mod and go.sum
  4. Run your test suite to verify the upgrade does not break functionality
Caveat Minimal risk - this is a security patch for an out-of-bounds read; however, always verify with tests

Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.

We can apply and verify the patch for your build — typical engagement from $3,200. Get the patch applied

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References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.

Primary sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2023-42821 in production — separate from our analysis above.

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What this is

A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.

What belongs here
  • Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
  • No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
  • No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data