@babel/runtime versions 7.23.7 and 7.23.6 represent incremental updates to Babel's modular runtime helpers, essential for projects leveraging modern JavaScript features. Both versions share the same core purpose: providing pre-compiled, reusable helper functions that support Babel's transpilation process, avoiding code duplication and reducing bundle sizes. They both depend on "regenerator-runtime":"^0.14.0" to enable features like async/await.
The primary difference lies in the release date and potentially subtle bug fixes or performance improvements. Version 7.23.7 was released on December 29, 2023, while 7.23.6 was released on December 11, 2023. Looking at the dist block of data we can also see that version 7.23.7 is very slightly smaller when unpacked, taking 245594 bytes to version 7.23.6's 245612.
For developers using @babel/runtime, these updates generally warrant consideration, particularly for those seeking the most stable and optimized environment. Updating to the latest version (7.23.7) is recommended to benefit from any recent fixes or enhancements addressing edge cases. However, given, the similar file count and size, the changes between versions are likely small. You may wish to consult any dedicated changelog or release notes on the Babel GitHub repository for a more detailed breakdown of the specific modifications introduced in version 7.23.7. Ignoring the updates is also a valid decision if your project is stable as is.
All the vulnerabilities related to the version 7.23.7 of the package
Babel has inefficient RegExp complexity in generated code with .replace when transpiling named capturing groups
When using Babel to compile regular expression named capturing groups, Babel will generate a polyfill for the .replace method that has quadratic complexity on some specific replacement pattern strings (i.e. the second argument passed to .replace).
Your generated code is vulnerable if all the following conditions are true:
.replace method on a regular expression that contains named capturing groups.replaceIf you are using @babel/preset-env with the targets option, the transform that injects the vulnerable code is automatically enabled if:
You can verify what transforms @babel/preset-env is using by enabling the debug option.
This problem has been fixed in @babel/helpers and @babel/runtime 7.26.10 and 8.0.0-alpha.17, please upgrade. It's likely that you do not directly depend on @babel/helpers, and instead you depend on @babel/core (which itself depends on @babel/helpers). Upgrading to @babel/core 7.26.10 is not required, but it guarantees that you are on a new enough @babel/helpers version.
Please note that just updating your Babel dependencies is not enough: you will also need to re-compile your code.
If you are passing user-provided strings as the second argument of .replace on regular expressions that contain named capturing groups, validate the input and make sure it does not contain the substring $< if it's then not followed by > (possibly with other characters in between).
This vulnerability was reported and fixed in https://github.com/babel/babel/pull/17173.