GHSA-37f3-6p89-6qr9
Grav: Authenticated ReDoS via regex_replace in Twig Sandbox
Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Affected | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|---|
| Packagist | getgrav/grav | < 2.0.4 | 2.0.4 |
Details
As written in the advisory (Markdown source, shown as plain text).
### Summary
The `regex_replace` filter and function are allowlisted in Grav's Twig content sandbox. When Twig processing in page content is enabled `security.twig_content.process_enabled: true`, authenticated page editors can supply a catastrophically backtracking PCRE pattern, causing unbounded CPU consumption and denying service to the entire web server process.
---
### Details
The Twig sandbox allowlists, defined in `system/config/security.yaml`, explicitly include `regex_replace` in both the filter and function permission lists:
**Source: `system/config/security.yaml`**
```yaml
twig_sandbox:
allowed_filters:
# ...
- regex_replace # user-controlled pattern allowed in sandbox
allowed_functions:
# ...
- regex_replace # same
```
The underlying implementation passes the caller-controlled `$pattern` directly into PHP's `preg_replace()` without any pattern complexity validation:
**Source: `system/src/Grav/Common/Twig/Extension/GravExtension.php:1317-1319`**
```php
public function regexReplace($subject, $pattern, $replace, $limit = -1)
{
return preg_replace($pattern, $replace, $subject, $limit);
}
```
When `twig_content.process_enabled` is `true`, page body content is sandboxed but can use any allowlisted filter. An editor who embeds a catastrophic backtracking pattern causes the PCRE engine to enter exponential time complexity, consuming 100% CPU until the PHP process is killed or the request times out.
**Conditions required**:
1. `security.twig_content.process_enabled: true` (opt-in, `false` by default on fresh 2.0 installs)
2. `security.twig_sandbox.enabled: true` (default) - the function is reachable under sandbox
3. Attacker must have page edit access (authenticated contributor / editor role)
---
### PoC
**Configuration prerequisite** - enable Twig in content:
```yaml
# user/config/security.yaml
twig_content:
process_enabled: true
```
**Payload** — embed in any Grav page body with `process: { twig: true }` in frontmatter:
```
---
title: Test
process:
twig: true
---
{{ 'aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaab'|regex_replace('/^(a+)+$/', '') }}
```
Or as a function call in a page where the editor has Twig access:
```twig
{{ regex_replace('aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaab', '/^(a+)+$/', '') }}
```
**Result**: The PHP-FPM worker (or CLI server process) enters catastrophic PCRE backtracking. On a 2 GHz host, a 32-character string with the above pattern will exhaust one CPU core for seconds to minutes. With a slightly longer string, the time grows exponentially.
---
### Impact
**Vulnerability type**: Regular Expression Denial of Service - ReDoS
**Who is impacted**: Server availability. Any Grav installation where:
- An editor-role account exists (or has been compromised), AND
- The operator has enabled `twig_content.process_enabled: true`
An attacker with page-edit access can render the site unresponsive for all visitors by publishing a page with a catastrophic regex. On single-worker PHP configurations this is a complete outage. On multi-worker setups, multiple concurrent page renders of the malicious page can saturate all workers.
---
References
External links from the advisory. They lead to third-party sites.