Hostname spoofing via backslashes in URL

Overview

Impact

urijs before version 1.19.6 is affected by hostname spoofing issue.

If using urijs to determine a URL’s hostname, the hostname can be spoofed by using a backslash (\) character as part of the scheme delimiter, e.g. scheme:/\hostname. If the hostname is used in security decisions, the decision may be incorrect.

Depending on library usage and attacker intent, impacts may include allow/block list bypasses, SSRF attacks, open redirects, or other undesired behavior.

Example URL: https:/\expected-example.com/path
Escaped string: https:/\\expected-example.com/path (JavaScript strings must escape backslash)

Affected versions incorrectly return no hostname. Patched versions correctly return expected-example.com. Patched versions match the behavior of other parsers which implement the WHATWG URL specification, including web browsers and Node’s built-in URL class.

Recommendation

Upgrade to version 1.19.6

References

• GitHub Advisory
• CVE
• Previous similar issue in urijs