CVE-2021-29445Padding Oracle Attack due to Observable Timing Discrepancy in jose-node-esm-runtime
- 5.9MediumCVSS base score
- 1.1%Exploitation in 30 daysEPSS · top 35% of all CVEs
- NoKnown exploitednot in CISA's KEV catalog
- NonePublic exploitsnone known yet
Description
jose-node-esm-runtime is an npm package which provides a number of cryptographic functions. In versions prior to 3.11.4 the 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. But 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). A patch was released which ensures the HMAC tag is verified before performing CBC decryption. The fixed versions are `>=3.11.4`. Users should upgrade to `^3.11.4`.
Timeline
ID reserved
By GitHub_M
- 17 days later
· 17 days later
Published
- 3 years later
· 3 years later
Record updated
Changes after publication (a new score, a public exploit, EPSS crossing 1, 10 or 50 %, leaving KEV) are kept since November 2026; earlier ones are not known.
Scores
| Scored by | CVSS | Score | Vector |
|---|---|---|---|
| GitHub_MCNA (assigner) | 3.1 | Medium5.9 | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N |
| NVDNVD · Modified | 3.1 | Medium5.9 | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N |
- EPSS (exploitation in 30 days)
- 1.1% · top 35% of all CVEs (13 Nov 2026)
The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: Medium 5.9.
Affected products
- affected < 3.11.4
Affected packages
From reviewed advisories of the GitHub Advisory Database.
- npmjose-node-esm-runtimeGHSA-4v4g-726h-xvfv (opens in a new tab)
References
References2
- https://github.com/panva/jose/security/advisories/GHSA-4v4g-726h-xvfv (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_CONFIRMx_transferred
- https://www.npmjs.com/package/jose-node-esm-runtime (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
Sources
The same CVE in the primary databases and aggregators, to check against.
- CVE.org record (opens in a new tab)
- CVE List JSON (GitHub) (opens in a new tab)
- NVD (opens in a new tab)
- FIRST EPSS (opens in a new tab)
- EUVD EUVD-2021-0760 (opens in a new tab)
- OSV.dev (opens in a new tab)
- GitHub Advisory GHSA-4v4g-726h-xvfv (opens in a new tab)
- CIRCL Vulnerability-Lookup (opens in a new tab)
Badge for a README or a ticket
[](https://cveledger.app/cve/CVE-2021-29445)Record last updated .