GHSA-c9rx-x947-fp3h
ApostropheCMS sanitize-html: unbounded recursion when re-sanitizing the fallback of a discarded iframe (stack overflow, nestingLimit not enforced)
Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Affected | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|---|
| npm | sanitize-html | >= 2.18.0, < 2.18.1 | 2.18.1 |
Details
As written in the advisory (Markdown source, shown as plain text).
### Summary
Since 2.18.0, when an `<iframe>` is not allowed and `disallowedTagsMode` is `'discard'` (the defaults),
its raw-text content is re-sanitized by a recursive call to `sanitizeHtml(text, options)` (the change
from #5564, fixing #5550). The recursion has no bound and starts each nested call with a fresh state.
Two consequences, both absent from 2.17.7 and 2.17.4:
1. A few kilobytes of unclosed `<iframe>` tags throw `RangeError: Maximum call stack size exceeded`
with the default options. Any application that sanitizes untrusted HTML with 2.18.0 can be made to
throw on a small crafted input.
2. `nestingLimit` is not enforced across a discarded iframe: each nested iframe restarts the depth
count at zero, so the output can be nested arbitrarily deep regardless of the configured limit.
### Affected versions
- 2.18.0 (the current `latest`), and the `main` branch at the time of writing (the recursive call is
still in `packages/sanitize-html/index.js`, in the `ontext` handler, branch
`tag === 'iframe' && !tagAllowed(tag) && options.disallowedTagsMode === 'discard'`).
- Not affected: 2.17.7 and 2.17.4 (tested with the same inputs below).
Tested with Node.js v26.7.0.
### Reproduction 1: stack overflow with the default options
```js
const sanitizeHtml = require('sanitize-html');
// with 2.18.0:
sanitizeHtml('<iframe>'.repeat(1000)); // 8,000 chars: returns ''
sanitizeHtml('<iframe>'.repeat(2000)); // 16,000 chars: throws RangeError: Maximum call stack size exceeded
sanitizeHtml('<iframe>'.repeat(20000)); // 160,000 chars: throws RangeError: Maximum call stack size exceeded
```
Results:
| input | 2.17.4 | 2.17.7 | 2.18.0 |
|---|---|---|---|
| `'<iframe>'.repeat(1000)` | ok | ok | ok |
| `'<iframe>'.repeat(2000)` | ok | ok | RangeError |
| `'<iframe>'.repeat(20000)` | ok | ok | RangeError |
The threshold depends on the remaining stack, so it is lower when `sanitizeHtml` is called from an
already deep call stack (for example inside a server-side rendering pass).
### Reproduction 2: `nestingLimit` is bypassed
```js
const sanitizeHtml = require('sanitize-html');
const input = ('<iframe>' + '<b>'.repeat(3)).repeat(50) + 'x';
const out = sanitizeHtml(input, { allowedTags: ['b'], nestingLimit: 3 });
// maximum nesting depth of <b> in `out`:
// 2.17.4: 2 2.17.7: 0 (fallback escaped as text) 2.18.0: 150
```
Without an iframe, the same options cap the output at three nested `<b>` in all three versions. With
`k` repetitions of `'<iframe>' + '<b>'.repeat(3)`, 2.18.0 returns `3 * k` nested `<b>` (measured for
k = 1, 5, 50: depth 3, 15, 150).
### Cause
In 2.18.0 the `ontext` handler does:
```js
} else if (
tag === 'iframe' &&
!tagAllowed(tag) &&
options.disallowedTagsMode === 'discard'
) {
result += sanitizeHtml(text, options);
}
```
Because htmlparser2 treats `<iframe>` as a raw-text element, the text of an unclosed iframe is the whole
remainder of the input; re-parsing it can meet another unclosed `<iframe>`, and so on, one stack frame
(and one full re-parse) per iframe. The nested call also starts with its own `depth`, so tags inside the
fallback are not counted against `nestingLimit` together with the enclosing tags.
### Possible directions
Not a patch, only what would close both effects: bound the recursion (or process the fallback without
recursing), and carry the current depth into the nested sanitization so that `nestingLimit` applies to
the whole output.
References
External links from the advisory. They lead to third-party sites.
- https://github.com/apostrophecms/apostrophe/security/advisories/GHSA-c9rx-x947-fp3h
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-113650
- https://github.com/apostrophecms/apostrophe/commit/06e4b377f3c360f9e89c32dccd7e505ad5ddf498
- https://github.com/apostrophecms/apostrophe/commit/40b989b1a9dd23d30029b8ce7668634265cfe5ea
- https://github.com/apostrophecms/apostrophe
- https://github.com/apostrophecms/apostrophe/releases/tag/[email protected]