Hono has Body Limit Middleware Bypass

Summary

A flaw in the bodyLimit middleware could allow bypassing the configured request body size limit when conflicting HTTP headers were present.

Details

The middleware previously prioritized the Content-Length header even when a Transfer-Encoding: chunked header was also included. According to the HTTP specification, Content-Length must be ignored in such cases. This discrepancy could allow oversized request bodies to bypass the configured limit.

Most standards-compliant runtimes and reverse proxies may reject such malformed requests with 400 Bad Request, so the practical impact depends on the runtime and deployment environment.

Impact

If body size limits are used as a safeguard against large or malicious requests, this flaw could allow attackers to send oversized request bodies. The primary risk is denial of service (DoS) due to excessive memory or CPU consumption when handling very large requests.

Resolution

The implementation has been updated to align with the HTTP specification, ensuring that Transfer-Encoding takes precedence over Content-Length. The issue is fixed in Hono v4.9.7, and all users should upgrade immediately.