CVE-2026-33532

yaml is vulnerable to Stack Overflow via deeply nested YAML collections

State
Published
Severity
4.3 Medium
Published
Mar 26, 2026
Updated
Mar 30, 2026
Reserved
Mar 20, 2026

Read the record on cve.org

Description

`yaml` is a YAML parser and serialiser for JavaScript. Parsing a YAML document with a version of `yaml` on the 1.x branch prior to 1.10.3 or on the 2.x branch prior to 2.8.3 may throw a RangeError due to a stack overflow. The node resolution/composition phase uses recursive function calls without a depth bound. An attacker who can supply YAML for parsing can trigger a `RangeError: Maximum call stack size exceeded` with a small payload (~2–10 KB). The `RangeError` is not a `YAMLParseError`, so applications that only catch YAML-specific errors will encounter an unexpected exception type. Depending on the host application's exception handling, this can fail requests or terminate the Node.js process. Flow sequences allow deep nesting with minimal bytes (2 bytes per level: one `[` and one `]`). On the default Node.js stack, approximately 1,000–5,000 levels of nesting (2–10 KB input) exhaust the call stack. The exact threshold is environment-dependent (Node.js version, stack size, call stack depth at invocation). Note: the library's `Parser` (CST phase) uses a stack-based iterative approach and is not affected. Only the compose/resolve phase uses actual call-stack recursion. All three public parsing APIs are affected: `YAML.parse()`, `YAML.parseDocument()`, and `YAML.parseAllDocuments()`. Versions 1.10.3 and 2.8.3 contain a patch.

Scores

CVSSScoreVectorSource
3.14.3 MediumCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:LGitHub_M

Weaknesses

Affected Products

ProductVersions
yamleemeli
  • >= 2.0.0, < 2.8.3Affected
  • >= 1.0.0, < 1.10.3Affected

References

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