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Fencer Vulns
high 7.4

CVE-2023-40165 json

Unauthorized gem replacement for full names ending in numbers on rubygems.org

published 2023-08-17 3 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2023-44772

cvss
7.4
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.5%
EPSS 0.5% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 40%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

rubygems.org is the Ruby community's primary gem (library) hosting service. Insufficient input validation allowed malicious actors to replace any uploaded gem version that had a platform, version number, or gem name matching `/-\d/`, permanently replacing the legitimate upload in the canonical gem storage bucket, and triggering an immediate CDN purge so that the malicious gem would be served immediately. The maintainers have checked all gems matching the `/-\d/` pattern and can confirm that no unexpected `.gem`s were found. As a result, we believe this vulnerability was _not_ exploited. The easiest way to ensure that a user's applications were not exploited by this vulnerability is to check that all of your downloaded .gems have a checksum that matches the checksum recorded in the RubyGems.org database. RubyGems contributor Maciej Mensfeld wrote a tool to automatically check that all downloaded .gem files match the checksums recorded in the RubyGems.org database. You can use it by running: `bundle add bundler-integrity` followed by `bundle exec bundler-integrity`. Neither this tool nor anything else can prove you were not exploited, but the can assist your investigation by quickly comparing RubyGems API-provided checksums with the checksums of files on your disk. The issue has been patched with improved input validation and the changes are live. No action is required on the part of the user. Users are advised to validate their local gems.

Patch / fix

  • rubygems rubygems.org 2023-08-14

CISA SSVC

Exploitation
none
Automatable
no
Technical impact
partial
Assessed
2 y ago

Exploit prediction

0.46% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 40% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 3.1 7.4 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:N/I:H/A:N
NVD 3.1 7.5 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N

Affected products

  • rubygems rubygems.org

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-20 Improper Input Validation

References

Sources

Fencer Vulns keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.