Environment Variable Injection for dotenv API in zx

published 2025-02-03 21 mo ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also GHSA-qwp8-x4ff-5h87 , EUVD-2025-0220

cvss: 5.2; version 3.1, GitHub
cisa kev: Not listed; not in CISA's catalog
epss: 0.2%; EPSS 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 7%
public exploits: 0; none known

zx is a tool for writing better scripts. An attacker with control over environment variable values can inject unintended environment variables into `process.env`. This can lead to arbitrary command execution or unexpected behavior in applications that rely on environment variables for security-sensitive operations. Applications that process untrusted input and pass it through `dotenv.stringify` are particularly vulnerable. This issue has been patched in version 8.3.2. Users should immediately upgrade to this version to mitigate the vulnerability. If upgrading is not feasible, users can mitigate the vulnerability by sanitizing user-controlled environment variable values before passing them to `dotenv.stringify`. Specifically, avoid using `"`, `'`, and backticks in values, or enforce strict validation of environment variables before usage.

Patch / fix

fixed in 1 links 2

npm zx 8.3.2

github.com/google/zx@5ba714d commit
github.com/google/zx#1094 pull request

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2025-24959 updated 2025-11-21 cvss 0.0

zx: Environment Variable Injection for dotenv API in zx

Red Hat All currently supported Red Hat products
not affected: vulnerable code not present

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

CISA SSVC

Exploitation: none
Automatable: no
Technical impact: partial
Assessed: 21 mo ago (2025-02-03)

Exploit prediction

0.18% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 7% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by	version	score	vector
CNA	4.0	1.0	CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:P/PR:L/UI:A/VC:L/VI:L/VA:L/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
CNA	4.0	1.0	CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:P/PR:L/UI:A/VC:L/VI:L/VA:L/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X
GitHub	3.1	5.2	CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Affected packages

ecosystem	package	affected	fixed in
npm	zx	>=8.3.1, <8.3.2	8.3.2

Affected products

google zx

Classification

Weakness

CWE-94 Improper Control of Generation of Code
CWE-74 Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component

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.

Summary