Downloads Resources over HTTP in libxl

published 2018-06-01 8 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also GHSA-7vrq-vg6p-32fw , EUVD-2019-0255

cvss: 8.1; version 3.0, NVD
cisa kev: Not listed; not in CISA's catalog
epss: 1.7%; EPSS 1.7% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 77%
public exploits: 0; none known

libxl provides Node bindings for the libxl library for reading and writing excel (XLS and XLSX) spreadsheets. libxl downloads zipped resources over HTTP, which leaves it vulnerable to MITM attacks. It may be possible to cause remote code execution (RCE) by swapping out the requested zip file with an attacker controlled zip file if the attacker is on the network or positioned in between the user and the remote server.

Exploit prediction

1.73% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 77% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by	version	score	vector
NVD	3.0	8.1	CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
NVD	2.0	9.3	AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C

Affected packages

ecosystem	package	affected	fixed in
npm	libxl	<=0.4.5	no fix listed

Affected products

HackerOne libxl node module

Classification

Weakness

CWE-311 Missing Encryption of Sensitive Data
CWE-310 Cryptographic Issues
CWE-269 Improper Privilege Management

References

nodesecurity.io /advisories/178
third-party-advisory
nvd.nist.gov /vuln/detail/CVE-2016-10585
advisory
github.com /DirtyHairy/node-libxl
package
github.com /advisories/GHSA-7vrq-vg6p-32fw
advisory
npmjs.com /advisories/178
web

Sources

Fencer Intel keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.

Summary