CVE-2025-5889VulnerabilityPublished 9 Jun 2025Updated 11 Jun 2025

CVE-2025-5889: juliangruber brace-expansion · ReDoS

Affects juliangruber brace-expansionSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 2.3 Low.

Data as of 25 Oct 2026, 19:02 UTC

CVSS 4.0 base score

2.3Low

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 0.5% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 47% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:H/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:L/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:P

Base metrics

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: High
Attack Requirements: None
Privileges Required: Low
User Interaction: None
Vulnerable system confidentiality: None
Vulnerable system integrity: None
Vulnerable system availability: Low
Subsequent system confidentiality: None
Subsequent system integrity: None
Subsequent system availability: None

Threat metrics

Exploit Maturity: POC

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable system is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed below, up to and including the entire Internet. Such a vulnerability is often termed “remotely exploitable” and can be thought of as an attack being exploitable at the protocol level one or more network hops away (e.g., across one or more routers).
Attack Complexity: High: The successful attack depends on the evasion or circumvention of security-enhancing techniques in place that would otherwise hinder the attack. These include: Evasion of exploit mitigation techniques, for example, circumvention of address space randomization (ASLR) or data execution prevention (DEP) must be performed for the attack to be successful; Obtaining target-specific secrets. The attacker must gather some target-specific secret before the attack can be successful. A secret is any piece of information that cannot be obtained through any amount of reconnaissance. To obtain the secret the attacker must perform additional attacks or break otherwise secure measures (e.g. knowledge of a secret key may be needed to break a crypto channel). This operation must be performed for each attacked target.
Attack Requirements: None: The successful attack does not depend on the deployment and execution conditions of the vulnerable system. The attacker can expect to be able to reach the vulnerability and execute the exploit under all or most instances of the vulnerability.
Privileges Required: Low: The attacker requires privileges that provide basic capabilities that are typically limited to settings and resources owned by a single low-privileged user. Alternatively, an attacker with Low privileges has the ability to access only non-sensitive resources.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without interaction from any human user, other than the attacker.
Vulnerable system confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the Vulnerable System.
Vulnerable system integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the Vulnerable System.
Vulnerable system availability: Low: Performance is reduced or there are interruptions in resource availability. Even if repeated exploitation of the vulnerability is possible, the attacker does not have the ability to completely deny service to legitimate users. The resources in the Vulnerable System are either partially available all of the time, or fully available only some of the time, but overall there is no direct, serious consequence to the Vulnerable System.
Subsequent system confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the Subsequent System or all confidentiality impact is constrained to the Vulnerable System.
Subsequent system integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the Subsequent System or all integrity impact is constrained to the Vulnerable System.
Subsequent system availability: None: There is no impact to availability within the Subsequent System or all availability impact is constrained to the Vulnerable System.
Exploit Maturity: POC: Based on threat intelligence sources each of the following must apply: · Proof-of-concept is publicly available · No knowledge of reported attempts to exploit this vulnerability · No knowledge of publicly available solutions used to simplify attempts to exploit the vulnerability

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v4.0 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 9 Jun 2025
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 2026-10-25.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
npmjuliangruber/brace-expansion`pkg:npm/juliangruber/brace-expansion`Other threats	Affected =1.1.0 =1.1.1 =1.1.2 =1.1.3 =1.1.4 =1.1.5 =1.1.6 =1.1.7 =1.1.8 =1.1.9 =1.1.10 =1.1.11 =2.0.0 =2.0.1 =3.0.0 =4.0.0	Fixed in–

Check your own hosts for these packages with threat-finder (opens in a new tab), our free open-source scanner.

AI-suggested

1. Immediate upgrade of the juliangruber brace-expansion library to versions 1.1.12, 2.0.2, 3.0.1, or 4.0.1 as applicable. 2. Conduct a thorough inventory of software dependencies to identify all instances of the vulnerable library, including transitive dependencies in Node.js projects. 3. Implement runtime monitoring to detect abnormal CPU usage patterns that may indicate exploitation attempts. 4. Employ rate limiting and input validation on endpoints that accept user input potentially processed by brace-expansion to reduce attack surface. 5. Integrate automated dependency scanning tools into CI/CD pipelines to catch vulnerable versions early. 6. Review and harden application logging to capture detailed information on input patterns triggering the expansion function for forensic analysis. 7. Engage with software vendors or third-party providers to confirm patch application if the library is embedded in commercial products. 8. Maintain updated incident response plans that include scenarios for resource exhaustion attacks.

Description

A vulnerability was found in juliangruber brace-expansion up to 1.1.11/2.0.1/3.0.0/4.0.0. It has been rated as problematic. Affected by this issue is the function expand of the file index.js. The manipulation leads to inefficient regular expression complexity. The attack may be launched remotely. The complexity of an attack is rather high. The exploitation is known to be difficult. The exploit has been disclosed to the public and may be used. Upgrading to version 1.1.12, 2.0.2, 3.0.1 and 4.0.1 is able to address this issue. The name of the patch is a5b98a4f30d7813266b221435e1eaaf25a1b0ac5. It is recommended to upgrade the affected component.

Impact

For European organizations, the primary impact of CVE-2025-5889 is the potential for denial of service through resource exhaustion caused by inefficient regular expression processing. This can affect web applications, backend services, or any software components that utilize the vulnerable brace-expansion library for pattern expansion. While the severity is low, the impact could be more pronounced in high-availability environments or critical infrastructure where service disruption is costly. Since the vulnerability does not require user interaction or authentication, any exposed service using the affected library could be targeted remotely. However, the high complexity of exploitation and lack of widespread active exploitation reduce immediate risk. Organizations relying on Node.js or JavaScript-based tooling that includes this library should assess their dependency chains. Failure to patch could lead to degraded service performance or outages, impacting business continuity and user experience.

References

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 10 Jul 2025, 22:33 UTC

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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