Open-Source Security Intelligence

Know every vulnerability
before it knows you.

DevGuard continuously monitors your dependencies and alerts you when CVEs like this one affect your stack — with real-time threat intelligence built for developers.

Checkout DevGuard View on GitHub

GHSA-h64w-w9pr-82m4

HighCVSS 7.5 / 10

Published May 29, 2026·Last modified May 29, 2026

Affected Components(1)

exifreader

2.10.0 – 4.39.0

Description

Impact

When parsing an image with an embedded ICC profile that contains a crafted multiLocalizedUnicodeType (mluc) tag, ExifReader can be made to allocate memory proportional to attacker-controlled fields in the tag rather than to the actual size of the input. Processing such an image causes excessive memory consumption and can terminate the host process (out-of-memory).

Any application that calls ExifReader.load() on untrusted images, for example, user uploads in a web service, is affected. ICC profiles are carried in JPEG, TIFF, PNG, HEIC, AVIF, JPEG XL, and WebP, so the issue is reachable from any of those formats.

Patches

Fixed in exifreader@4.39.0. Upgrade with:

npm install exifreader@latest

Bower users consume the bundled dist/ files from this repository, and the same fix is committed there.

Workarounds

If upgrading is not immediately possible, configure a custom build that excludes the icc module so that ICC parsing (and therefore this code path) is skipped entirely.

Resources

Reporter's writeup: https://gist.github.com/yuki-matsuhashi/3243ea38e5fbf8cfe19b624f04c9f4b4
Patch: https://github.com/mattiasw/ExifReader/commit/c9d88b67e127b2dcc7b46e328df468257fb2dc30

Risk Scores

Base Score

7.5

The vulnerability can be exploited over the network without needing physical access. It is easy for an attacker to exploit this vulnerability. An attacker does not need any special privileges or access rights. No user interaction is needed for the attacker to exploit this vulnerability. The impact is confined to the system where the vulnerability exists. There is a high impact on the availability of the system.

Threat Intelligence

6.9

Exploitation attempts have been detected. Elevated vigilance and prompt remediation are advised.

EPSS

N/A

Probability that this vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days.

Exploit

Not available

We did not find any exploit available. Neither in GitHub repositories nor in the Exploit-Database.

Browse More

High severity

Scan your project

Continuously monitor your dependencies and get alerted when vulnerabilities like this one affect your stack.