The babel-plugin-transform-async-to-generator package, a crucial tool for developers targeting older JavaScript environments, facilitates the use of async/await syntax by transforming asynchronous functions into ES2015 generators. Examining versions 6.0.2 and 6.0.14 reveals key differences that impact developer experience.
Version 6.0.14, released shortly after 6.0.2, demonstrates refinements in its internal dependencies. While both versions rely on babel-helper-remap-async-to-generator and babel-plugin-syntax-async-functions for core functionality, and include babel-runtime, version 6.0.14 mandates a newer version of babel-helper-remap-async-to-generator and babel-plugin-syntax-async-functions. It's also worth noting that babel-runtime changes from version ^6.0.2 to version ^5.0.0. This highlights the ongoing development within the Babel ecosystem and the push to keep the related package versions aligned and compatible.
One potentially relevant change lies in the repository URL. Version 6.0.2 uses git+https://github.com/babel/babel.git, while 6.0.14 uses https://github.com/babel/babel/tree/master/packages/babel-plugin-transform-async-to-generator, potentially indicating a shift toward referencing the specific package location within the Babel repository.
Developers upgrading should therefore check for compatibility with their existing Babel setup. These version updates, while seemingly minor, often include bug fixes, performance improvements, and enhanced compatibility with other Babel plugins and presets, ultimately contributing to a smoother and more reliable transpilation process.
All the vulnerabilities related to the version 6.0.14 of the package
Babel vulnerable to arbitrary code execution when compiling specifically crafted malicious code
Using Babel to compile code that was specifically crafted by an attacker can lead to arbitrary code execution during compilation, when using plugins that rely on the path.evaluate()or path.evaluateTruthy() internal Babel methods.
Known affected plugins are:
@babel/plugin-transform-runtime@babel/preset-env when using its useBuiltIns option@babel/helper-define-polyfill-provider, such as babel-plugin-polyfill-corejs3, babel-plugin-polyfill-corejs2, babel-plugin-polyfill-es-shims, babel-plugin-polyfill-regeneratorNo other plugins under the @babel/ namespace are impacted, but third-party plugins might be.
Users that only compile trusted code are not impacted.
The vulnerability has been fixed in @babel/traverse@7.23.2.
Babel 6 does not receive security fixes anymore (see Babel's security policy), hence there is no patch planned for babel-traverse@6.
@babel/traverse to v7.23.2 or higher. You can do this by deleting it from your package manager's lockfile and re-installing the dependencies. @babel/core >=7.23.2 will automatically pull in a non-vulnerable version.@babel/traverse and are using one of the affected packages mentioned above, upgrade them to their latest version to avoid triggering the vulnerable code path in affected @babel/traverse versions:
@babel/plugin-transform-runtime v7.23.2@babel/preset-env v7.23.2@babel/helper-define-polyfill-provider v0.4.3babel-plugin-polyfill-corejs2 v0.4.6babel-plugin-polyfill-corejs3 v0.8.5babel-plugin-polyfill-es-shims v0.10.0babel-plugin-polyfill-regenerator v0.5.3