Security Bulletin: Multiple security vulnerabilities are addressed with Cloud Pak foundational services 4.17.0 shipped with IBM Cloud Pak for Business Automation iFixes for April 2026

Vulnerability Details

CVEID:   CVE-2022-23990
DESCRIPTION:   Expat (aka libexpat) before 2.4.4 has an integer overflow in the doProlog function.
CWE:   CWE-190: Integer Overflow or Wraparound
CVSS Source:   IBM X-Force
CVSS Base score:   9.8
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H)

CVEID:   CVE-2024-28757
DESCRIPTION:   libexpat through 2.6.1 allows an XML Entity Expansion attack when there is isolated use of external parsers (created via XML_ExternalEntityParserCreate).
CWE:   CWE-776: Improper Restriction of Recursive Entity References in DTDs ('XML Entity Expansion')
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   7.5
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-12758
DESCRIPTION:   Versions of the package validator before 13.15.22 are vulnerable to Incomplete Filtering of One or More Instances of Special Elements in the isLength() function that does not take into account Unicode variation selectors (\uFE0F, \uFE0E) appearing in a sequence which lead to improper string length calculation. This can lead to an application using isLength for input validation accepting strings significantly longer than intended, resulting in issues like data truncation in databases, buffer overflows in other system components, or denial-of-service.
CWE:   CWE-792: Incomplete Filtering of One or More Instances of Special Elements
CVSS Source:   report@snyk.io
CVSS Base score:   7.5
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-13465
DESCRIPTION:   Lodash versions 4.0.0 through 4.17.22 are vulnerable to prototype pollution in the _.unset and _.omit functions. An attacker can pass crafted paths which cause Lodash to delete methods from global prototypes. The issue permits deletion of properties but does not allow overwriting their original behavior. This issue is patched on 4.17.23
CWE:   CWE-1321: Improperly Controlled Modification of Object Prototype Attributes ('Prototype Pollution')
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   5.3
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-14874
DESCRIPTION:   A flaw was found in Nodemailer. This vulnerability allows a denial of service (DoS) via a crafted email address header that triggers infinite recursion in the address parser.
CWE:   CWE-703: Improper Check or Handling of Exceptional Conditions
CVSS Source:   secalert@redhat.com
CVSS Base score:   7.5
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-15284
DESCRIPTION:   Improper Input Validation vulnerability in qs (parse modules) allows HTTP DoS.This issue affects qs: 6.14.1. Summary The arrayLimit option in qs did not enforce limits for bracket notation (a[]=1&a[]=2), only for indexed notation (a[0]=1). This is a consistency bug; arrayLimit should apply uniformly across all array notations. Note: The default parameterLimit of 1000 effectively mitigates the DoS scenario originally described. With default options, bracket notation cannot produce arrays larger than parameterLimit regardless of arrayLimit, because each a[]=valueconsumes one parameter slot. The severity has been reduced accordingly. Details The arrayLimit option only checked limits for indexed notation (a[0]=1&a[1]=2) but did not enforce it for bracket notation (a[]=1&a[]=2). Vulnerable code (lib/parse.js:159-162): if (root === '[]' && options.parseArrays) { obj = utils.combine([], leaf); // No arrayLimit check } Working code (lib/parse.js:175): else if (index = options.arrayLimit) { // Limit checked here obj = []; obj[index] = leaf; } The bracket notation handler at line 159 uses utils.combine([], leaf) without validating against options.arrayLimit, while indexed notation at line 175 checks index = options.arrayLimit before creating arrays. PoC const qs = require('qs'); const result = qs.parse('a[]=1&a[]=2&a[]=3&a[]=4&a[]=5&a[]=6', { arrayLimit: 5 }); console.log(result.a.length); // Output: 6 (should be max 5) Note on parameterLimit interaction: The original advisory's "DoS demonstration" claimed a length of 10,000, but parameterLimit (default: 1000) caps parsing to 1,000 parameters. With default options, the actual output is 1,000, not 10,000. Impact Consistency bug in arrayLimit enforcement. With default parameterLimit, the practical DoS risk is negligible since parameterLimit already caps the total number of parsed parameters (and thus array elements from bracket notation). The risk increases only when parameterLimit is explicitly set to a very high value.
CWE:   CWE-20: Improper Input Validation
CVSS Source:   harborist
CVSS Base score:   3.7
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-5372
DESCRIPTION:   A flaw was found in libssh versions built with OpenSSL versions older than 3.0, specifically in the ssh_kdf() function responsible for key derivation. Due to inconsistent interpretation of return values where OpenSSL uses 0 to indicate failure and libssh uses 0 for success—the function may mistakenly return a success status even when key derivation fails. This results in uninitialized cryptographic key buffers being used in subsequent communication, potentially compromising SSH sessions' confidentiality, integrity, and availability.
CWE:   CWE-682: Incorrect Calculation
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   8.8
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-55130
DESCRIPTION:   A flaw in Node.js’s Permissions model allows attackers to bypass `--allow-fs-read` and `--allow-fs-write` restrictions using crafted relative symlink paths. By chaining directories and symlinks, a script granted access only to the current directory can escape the allowed path and read sensitive files. This breaks the expected isolation guarantees and enables arbitrary file read/write, leading to potential system compromise. This vulnerability affects users of the permission model on Node.js v20, v22, v24, and v25.
CWE:   CWE-289: Authentication Bypass by Alternate Name
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   9.1
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-55132
DESCRIPTION:   A flaw in Node.js's permission model allows a file's access and modification timestamps to be changed via `futimes()` even when the process has only read permissions. Unlike `utimes()`, `futimes()` does not apply the expected write-permission checks, which means file metadata can be modified in read-only directories. This behavior could be used to alter timestamps in ways that obscure activity, reducing the reliability of logs. This vulnerability affects users of the permission model on Node.js v20, v22, v24, and v25.
CWE:   CWE-276: Incorrect Default Permissions
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   5.3
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:N/A:N)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-59465
DESCRIPTION:   A malformed `HTTP/2 HEADERS` frame with oversized, invalid `HPACK` data can cause Node.js to crash by triggering an unhandled `TLSSocket` error `ECONNRESET`. Instead of safely closing the connection, the process crashes, enabling a remote denial of service. This primarily affects applications that do not attach explicit error handlers to secure sockets, for example: ``` server.on('secureConnection', socket = { socket.on('error', err = { console.log(err) }) }) ```
CWE:   CWE-400: Uncontrolled Resource Consumption
CVSS Source:   support@hackerone.com
CVSS Base score:   7.5
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-59466
DESCRIPTION:   We have identified a bug in Node.js error handling where "Maximum call stack size exceeded" errors become uncatchable when `async_hooks.createHook()` is enabled. Instead of reaching `process.on('uncaughtException')`, the process terminates, making the crash unrecoverable. Applications that rely on `AsyncLocalStorage` (v22, v20) or `async_hooks.createHook()` (v24, v22, v20) become vulnerable to denial-of-service crashes triggered by deep recursion under specific conditions.
CWE:   CWE-248: Uncaught Exception
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   7.5
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-65945
DESCRIPTION:   auth0/node-jws is a JSON Web Signature implementation for Node.js. In versions 3.2.2 and earlier and version 4.0.0, auth0/node-jws has an improper signature verification vulnerability when using the HS256 algorithm under specific conditions. Applications are affected when they use the jws.createVerify() function for HMAC algorithms and use user-provided data from the JSON Web Signature protected header or payload in HMAC secret lookup routines, which can allow attackers to bypass signature verification. This issue has been patched in versions 3.2.3 and 4.0.1.
CWE:   CWE-347: Improper Verification of Cryptographic Signature
CVSS Source:   security-advisories@github.com
CVSS Base score:   7.5
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-68156
DESCRIPTION:   Expr is an expression language and expression evaluation for Go. Prior to version 1.17.7, several builtin functions in Expr, including `flatten`, `min`, `max`, `mean`, and `median`, perform recursive traversal over user-provided data structures without enforcing a maximum recursion depth. If the evaluation environment contains deeply nested or cyclic data structures, these functions may recurse indefinitely until exceed the Go runtime stack limit. This results in a stack overflow panic, causing the host application to crash. While exploitability depends on whether an attacker can influence or inject cyclic or pathologically deep data into the evaluation environment, this behavior represents a denial-of-service (DoS) risk and affects overall library robustness. Instead of returning a recoverable evaluation error, the process may terminate unexpectedly. In affected versions, evaluation of expressions that invoke certain builtin functions on untrusted or insufficiently validated data structures can lead to a process-level crash due to stack exhaustion. This issue is most relevant in scenarios where Expr is used to evaluate expressions against externally supplied or dynamically constructed environments; cyclic references (directly or indirectly) can be introduced into arrays, maps, or structs; and there are no application-level safeguards preventing deeply nested input data. In typical use cases with controlled, acyclic data, the issue may not manifest. However, when present, the resulting panic can be used to reliably crash the application, constituting a denial of service. The issue has been fixed in the v1.17.7 versions of Expr. The patch introduces a maximum recursion depth limit for affected builtin functions. When this limit is exceeded, evaluation aborts gracefully and returns a descriptive error instead of panicking. Additionally, the maximum depth can be customized by users via `builtin.MaxDepth`, allowing applications with legitimate deep structures to raise the limit in a controlled manner. Users are strongly encouraged to upgrade to the patched release, which includes both the recursion guard and comprehensive test coverage to prevent regressions. For users who cannot immediately upgrade, some mitigations are recommended. Ensure that evaluation environments cannot contain cyclic references, validate or sanitize externally supplied data structures before passing them to Expr, and/or wrap expression evaluation with panic recovery to prevent a full process crash (as a last-resort defensive measure). These workarounds reduce risk but do not fully eliminate the issue without the patch.
CWE:   CWE-770: Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling
CVSS Source:   security-advisories@github.com
CVSS Base score:   7.5
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H)

CVEID:   CVE-2025-68161
DESCRIPTION:   The Socket Appender in Apache Log4j Core versions 2.0-beta9 through 2.25.2 does not perform TLS hostname verification of the peer certificate, even when the verifyHostName https://logging.apache.org/log4j/2.x/manual/appenders/network.html#SslC… configuration attribute or the log4j2.sslVerifyHostName https://logging.apache.org/log4j/2.x/manual/systemproperties.html#log4j… system property is set to true. This issue may allow a man-in-the-middle attacker to intercept or redirect log traffic under the following conditions: * The attacker is able to intercept or redirect network traffic between the client and the log receiver. * The attacker can present a server certificate issued by a certification authority trusted by the Socket Appender’s configured trust store (or by the default Java trust store if no custom trust store is configured). Users are advised to upgrade to Apache Log4j Core version 2.25.3, which addresses this issue. As an alternative mitigation, the Socket Appender may be configured to use a private or restricted trust root to limit the set of trusted certificates.
CWE:   CWE-297: Improper Validation of Certificate with Host Mismatch
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   4.8
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:N)

CVEID:   CVE-2026-21637
DESCRIPTION:   A flaw in Node.js TLS error handling allows remote attackers to crash or exhaust resources of a TLS server when `pskCallback` or `ALPNCallback` are in use. Synchronous exceptions thrown during these callbacks bypass standard TLS error handling paths (tlsClientError and error), causing either immediate process termination or silent file descriptor leaks that eventually lead to denial of service. Because these callbacks process attacker-controlled input during the TLS handshake, a remote client can repeatedly trigger the issue. This vulnerability affects TLS servers using PSK or ALPN callbacks across Node.js versions where these callbacks throw without being safely wrapped.
CWE:   CWE-400: Uncontrolled Resource Consumption
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   7.5
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H)

CVEID:   CVE-2026-23745
DESCRIPTION:   node-tar is a Tar for Node.js. The node-tar library (= 7.5.2) fails to sanitize the linkpath of Link (hardlink) and SymbolicLink entries when preservePaths is false (the default secure behavior). This allows malicious archives to bypass the extraction root restriction, leading to Arbitrary File Overwrite via hardlinks and Symlink Poisoning via absolute symlink targets. This vulnerability is fixed in 7.5.3.
CWE:   CWE-22: Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory ('Path Traversal')
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   6.1
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:L/A:N)

CVEID:   CVE-2026-23950
DESCRIPTION:   node-tar,a Tar for Node.js, has a race condition vulnerability in versions up to and including 7.5.3. This is due to an incomplete handling of Unicode path collisions in the `path-reservations` system. On case-insensitive or normalization-insensitive filesystems (such as macOS APFS, In which it has been tested), the library fails to lock colliding paths (e.g., `ß` and `ss`), allowing them to be processed in parallel. This bypasses the library's internal concurrency safeguards and permits Symlink Poisoning attacks via race conditions. The library uses a `PathReservations` system to ensure that metadata checks and file operations for the same path are serialized. This prevents race conditions where one entry might clobber another concurrently. This is a Race Condition which enables Arbitrary File Overwrite. This vulnerability affects users and systems using node-tar on macOS (APFS/HFS+). Because of using `NFD` Unicode normalization (in which `ß` and `ss` are different), conflicting paths do not have their order properly preserved under filesystems that ignore Unicode normalization (e.g., APFS (in which `ß` causes an inode collision with `ss`)). This enables an attacker to circumvent internal parallelization locks (`PathReservations`) using conflicting filenames within a malicious tar archive. The patch in version 7.5.4 updates `path-reservations.js` to use a normalization form that matches the target filesystem's behavior (e.g., `NFKD`), followed by first `toLocaleLowerCase('en')` and then `toLocaleUpperCase('en')`. As a workaround, users who cannot upgrade promptly, and who are programmatically using `node-tar` to extract arbitrary tarball data should filter out all `SymbolicLink` entries (as npm does) to defend against arbitrary file writes via this file system entry name collision issue.
CWE:   CWE-176: Improper Handling of Unicode Encoding
CVSS Source:   NVD
CVSS Base score:   5.9
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N)

CVEID:   CVE-2026-24842
DESCRIPTION:   node-tar,a Tar for Node.js, contains a vulnerability in versions prior to 7.5.7 where the security check for hardlink entries uses different path resolution semantics than the actual hardlink creation logic. This mismatch allows an attacker to craft a malicious TAR archive that bypasses path traversal protections and creates hardlinks to arbitrary files outside the extraction directory. Version 7.5.7 contains a fix for the issue.
CWE:   CWE-22: Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory ('Path Traversal')
CVSS Source:   security-advisories@github.com
CVSS Base score:   8.2
CVSS Vector:   (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:H/I:L/A:N)