GitHub Advisoryadvisory · npm

GHSA-jwp9-9v96-94mx decompress allows arbitrary hardlink creation during archive extraction

MEDIUM Published 2026-07-10 Modified 2026-08-13 Official page ↗
Aliases
CVE-2026-39243
Ecosystem
npm
Packages
decompress
Severity
Moderate
CVSS vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
Weaknesses
CWE-59
Reviewed
2026-08-13

Affected packages

• npm decompress: <= 4.2.1 (no fix yet)

Description

decompress before 4.2.2 allows arbitrary hardlink creation during archive extraction, enabling file read disclosure and file corruption. When processing hardlink entries (type === 'link'), the x.linkname field from the archive is passed directly to fs.link() without validation (index.js line 113). An attacker can craft an archive with a hardlink entry whose linkname is an absolute path to any file on the same filesystem. This creates a hardlink inside the extraction directory that shares the same inode as the target file, enabling both reading and overwriting the original file's content. Hardlinks are limited to files on the same filesystem and cannot target directories.

Related

Alias · CVE (1)

  • CVE-2026-39243 decompress before 4.2.2 allows arbitrary hardlink creation during archive extraction, enabling file read disclosure and file corruption. vulnerability

Weakness · CWE (1)

  • CWE-59 Improper Link Resolution Before File Access weakness

References