CVE intelligence and bounded remediation

CVE-2023-32559 — A privilege escalation vulnerability exists in the experimental policy mechanism in all active release lines: 16.x, 18.x and, 20.x

High CVSS 7.5

A privilege escalation vulnerability exists in the experimental policy mechanism in all active release lines: 16.x, 18.x and, 20.x. The use of the deprecated API `process.binding()` can bypass the policy mechanism by requiring internal modules and eventually take advantage of `process.binding('spawn_sync')` run arbitrary code, outside of the limits defined in a `policy.json` file. Please note that at the time this CVE was issued, the policy is an experimental feature of Node.js.

Severity
High
CVSS
7.5 (3.1)
Published
2023-08-24
CISA KEV
Not currently listed
Ecosystem
javascript/npm
Weaknesses
CWE-269

Affected products

  • nodejs / node.js

Showing 1 representative product identities from 3 source matches. Confirm exact affected versions with the linked vendor and NVD evidence.

Matched remediation archetype

Privilege escalation and unsafe privilege management

This catalog composition supplies bounded fallback guidance. Explicitly reviewed curated workflows load with the complete record below.

Check exposure

  • Map service accounts, operating-system identities, roles, capabilities, impersonation, set-user transitions, and administrative helper paths.
  • Determine whether untrusted users or lower-privilege processes can reach the affected transition or modify inputs it trusts.
  • Review file, socket, registry, device, job, container, and cloud-role permissions used before and after privilege changes.

Remediate safely

  • Apply the supported fix and redesign privileged operations as a minimal, authenticated, allowlisted interface.
  • Drop privileges before processing untrusted input, verify the drop succeeds, and remove unnecessary roles, capabilities, and write permissions.
  • Validate ownership and permissions at time of use and add explicit lower-to-higher privilege boundary tests.

Authoritative sources

Complete CVE record and remediation plan

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