OpentelemetryApplication
CVE-2023-45142
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 · uneditedOpenTelemetry-Go Contrib is a collection of third-party packages for OpenTelemetry-Go. A handler wrapper out of the box adds labels `http.user_agent` and `http.method` that have unbound cardinality. It leads to the server's potential memory exhaustion when many malicious requests are sent to it. HTTP header User-Agent or HTTP method for requests can be easily set by an attacker to be random and long. The library internally uses `httpconv.ServerRequest` that records every value for HTTP `method` and `User-Agent`. In order to be affected, a program has to use the `otelhttp.NewHandler` wrapper and not filter any unknown HTTP methods or User agents on the level of CDN, LB, previous middleware, etc. Version 0.44.0 fixed this issue when the values collected for attribute `http.request.method` were changed to be restricted to a set of well-known values and other high cardinality attributes were removed. As a workaround to stop being affected, `otelhttp.WithFilter()` can be used, but it requires manual careful configuration to not log certain requests entirely. For convenience and safe usage of this library, it should by default mark with the label `unknown` non-standard HTTP methods and User agents to show that such requests were made but do not increase cardinality. In case someone wants to stay with the current behavior, library API should allow to enable it.
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 analysisThe application allocates memory, connections, or handles in response to a request without enforcing any cap, so a modest amount of malicious traffic exhausts the resource and denies service to everyone else. The fix is enforcing quotas, limits, and timeouts on what any single request or client can consume.
General guidance for the resource allocation without limits 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
OpentelemetryApplication
< 0.44.0CVSS 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 · scoped0.44.0
opentelemetry-go-contrib v0.44.0 or later
- Identify all Go projects that import opentelemetry-go-contrib (specifically otelhttp package) as a dependency
- Run `go list -m all` or check `go.mod` to confirm the current version of opentelemetry-go-contrib is below 0.44.0
- Update the dependency by running: `go get go.opentelemetry.io/contrib/instrumentation/net/http/otelhttp@latest` or specifically `go get go.opentelemetry.io/contrib/instrumentation/net/http/[email protected]`
- Verify the upgrade was successful by running `go list -m all` and confirming the version is 0.44.0 or later
- Run tests to ensure the upgrade does not break existing functionality
- Rebuild and redeploy the application
Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2023-45142 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2023-45142 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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