Vulnerability in req (CVE-2026-49755)
Summary
Vulnerability in req (CVE-2026-49755). Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure. Mitigation: upgrade to 0.6.1 or later.
Original description
The description as published by the source.
Summary
Improper Handling of Highly Compressed Data (Data Amplification) vulnerability in wojtekmach Req allows attacker-controlled HTTP servers to exhaust memory in a Req client via decompression-bomb response bodies.
Req's default response pipeline includes Req.Steps.decode_body/1 and Req.Steps.decompress_body/1 in lib/req/steps.ex. decode_body/1 dispatches on the server-supplied content-type (or URL extension) and calls :zip.extract(body, [:memory]) for application/zip, :erl_tar.extract({:binary, body}, [:memory]) for application/x-tar, and :erl_tar.extract({:binary, body}, [:memory, :compressed]) for application/gzip / .tgz. Each returns the full decompressed archive contents as a [{name, bytes}] list in memory, with no per-entry or total size cap. decompress_body/1 walks the content-encoding header and chains :zlib/:brotli/:ezstd decoders, so a response advertising content-encoding: gzip, gzip, gzip inflates through multiple layers without bound.
Both steps are enabled by default, no caller opt-in is required, and the attacker controls the content-type and content-encoding headers on their own server (or on any host reached via Req's automatic redirect following). A sub-megabyte response can expand to multiple gigabytes on the victim, crashing the BEAM process.
This issue affects req: from 0.1.0 before 0.6.1.
Workarounds
Disable Req's automatic body decoding on requests that fetch attacker-influenced URLs by passing decode_body: false to Req.ne…
Source: NIST National Vulnerability Database NVD GitHub Advisory
Auto-generated summary
Assembled by SecPulse from the source data (CVSS, CWE, affected versions) using templates — no AI involved. Check the original description and references below for exact details.
A vulnerability tracked as CVE-2026-49755 has been found in req.
Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure. CVSS score: 7.5/10.
What to do: upgrade req to 0.6.1 or later.
If unsure, ask your IT team or search "req CVE-2026-49755" on the vendor's site.
CVE-2026-49755 (req) — CWE-409 / CVSS v3 7.5
Attack vector: remote (network-reachable) / unauthenticated / no user interaction
Patched: 0.6.1 — apply immediately
Plan: 1) Audit SBOM/dependencies, 2) Stage→prod upgrade, 3) Add WAF/proxy monitoring on affected endpoints, 4) Hunt IOCs in logs.
Refs: see the GHSA / vendor advisory / patched release linked on this page.
A vulnerability (CWE-409) exists in req.
Check the vendor advisory for the affected versions of req.
Severity: High (CVSS 7.5/10). Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure.
Update to 0.6.1.
Until the patch is applied: disable the affected feature, apply WAF rules, or restrict access via network ACLs.
Search webserver/proxy logs for unusual request patterns matching this CVE's known IOCs. Run grep -r 'req' . against your dependency files (package-lock.json, requirements.txt, go.sum) to find affected services.
Response actions
Concrete steps and command examples for SOC/SRE teams to execute in order
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1Identify exposure identify
grep -r 'req' . | grep -v node_modulesリポジトリと本番環境の依存ファイル (package-lock.json / requirements.txt / go.sum / Gemfile.lock 等) で
reqを grep し、稼働しているサービス・バージョンを把握する。 -
2Apply patch patch
Upgrade req to 0.6.1ステージング環境で 0.6.1 に上げて回帰テスト → 本番反映。回帰テストはアプリの主要ハッピーパスを含めること。
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3Post-deployment verification verify
Confirm patched version is live in productionパッチ適用後、ステージングで PoC または同等の悪用パターンを再現して脆弱性が閉じたことを確認。本番ではアクセスログ・WAF でアラート再発が無いか継続監視。
Affected packages
References
- advisory github.com
- advisory nvd.nist.gov
- package hex.pm
- package github.com
- patch github.com
- web cna.erlef.org
- web osv.dev
- web github.com