XStream is vulnerable to a Denial of Service attack due to stack overflow from a manipulated binary input stream
Impact
The vulnerability may allow a remote attacker to terminate the application with a stack overflow error resulting in a denial of service only by manipulating the processed input stream when XStream is configured to use the BinaryStreamDriver.
Patches
XStream 1.4.21 detects the manipulation in the binary input stream causing the the stack overflow and raises an InputManipulationException instead.
Workarounds
The only solution is to catch the StackOverflowError in the client code calling XStream if XStream is configured to use the BinaryStreamDriver.
References
See full information about the nature of the vulnerability and the steps to reproduce it in XStream's documentation for CVE-2024-47072.
Credits
Alexis Challande of Trail Of Bits found and reported the issue to XStream and provided the required information to reproduce it.
Affected software
Click a technology to see all vulnerabilities affecting it.
| Platform | Package | Vulnerable versions | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|---|
| Java / Kotlin (Maven) | com.thoughtworks.xstream:xstream | < 1.4.21 | 1.4.21 |
References
- https://github.com/x-stream/xstream/security/advisories/GHSA-hfq9-hggm-c56q
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-47072
- https://github.com/x-stream/xstream/commit/bb838ce2269cac47433e31c77b2b236466e9f266
- https://github.com/x-stream/xstream/commit/fdd9f7d3de0d7ccf2f9979bcd09fbf3e6a0c881a
- https://github.com/x-stream/xstream
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2024/12/msg00023.html
- https://x-stream.github.io/CVE-2024-47072.html
- CVSS vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H- Weakness (CWE)
CWE-121, CWE-502- Platform
- Java / Kotlin (Maven)
- Package
com.thoughtworks.xstream:xstream- Disclosed
- 07.11.2024
- Updated
- 11.10.2026 12:22
Sources and licenses
OSV / GitHub Advisory Database - GHSA-hfq9-hggm-c56q - CC BY 4.0
Vulnerability history: com.thoughtworks.xstream:xstream
All published vulnerabilities of this package (Java / Kotlin (Maven)), newest first. Shows whether this is a one-off slip or a package that needs watching.
- Total entries
- 37
- First → latest
- 05.2019 11.2024
- Without a fix
- 0
- Exploited in attacks
- 1
Severity breakdown
- Critical 2
- High 22
- Medium 13
Disclosures per year
- 2019: 2
- 2020: 5
- 2021: 26
- 2022: 3
- 2023: 0
- 2024: 1
- 2025: 0
- 2026: 0
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XStream is vulnerable to a Denial of Service attack due to stack overflow from a manipulated binary input stream this entry
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