Skip to content
Fencer Intel
high 7.5

CVE-2026-96612 json

Path traversal in Hex via unvalidated dependency app names

published 30d ago modified 14h ago also EUVD-2026-97508 , GHSA-2vjj-c5hr-6xc3

Unreviewed: the maintainers' own advisory

Published by the maintainers on their GitHub repository hexpm/hex. GitHub has not reviewed it into the GitHub Advisory Database, so the affected packages and versions are the maintainers' word. Read the full advisory on GitHub.

cvss
7.5
version 4.0, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.4%
EPSS 0.4% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 38%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory ('Path Traversal') vulnerability in hexpm hex allows a malicious package publisher to delete a directory outside the project's deps directory and extract package files into it when a developer fetches dependencies.

A package release's requirements carry an app label that names the dependency's OTP application. Hex takes this label from the repository's signed registry and uses it as the dependency's application name without validating it (Hex.RemoteConverger.deps/2, Hex.Mix.to_lock/1). Mix derives the dependency's checkout directory as deps/<app>, and Hex.SCM.update/1 runs File.rm_rf!/1 on that directory and unpacks the package into it. hex.pm only checks the label's length, so a publisher can set it to a value such as ../../target. When a project depends on such a release directly or transitively, mix deps.get or mix deps.update deletes the directory the label resolves to and writes the labelled package's files there. This happens before any dependency code is compiled.

This issue affects hex: from 0.6.0 before 2.5.2.

Patch / fix

  • hexpm hex 2.5.2
  • erlang-hex Debian 14 2.5.3-2

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2026-96612

Is CVE-2026-96612 in your stack? Fencer shows which of your repositories are affected as soon as an advisory lands, and opens the fix as a pull request.

Check with Fencer

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2026-96612 updated cvss 8.8

hex: hex: Arbitrary code execution via path traversal in dependency application names

  • Red Hat All currently supported Red Hat products
    not affected: vulnerable code not present

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

CISA SSVC

Exploitation
none
Automatable
no
Technical impact
total
Assessed
26d ago

Exploit prediction

0.44% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 38% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-11).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 4.0 7.5 CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:A/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
CNA 4.0 7.5 CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:A/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X

Affected products

  • hexpm hex

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-22 Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory

References

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.

The maintainers of hexpm/hex published their own advisory on GitHub. Reviewed sources take precedence over it.

CPEs and fixed versions use Anchore's correction of NVD's data: Added CPE configurations because not yet analyzed by NVD.