Babel-preset-env is a powerful tool that allows developers to use the latest JavaScript features while ensuring compatibility with different environments. Versions 1.3.2 and 1.3.3 share the same core functionality of intelligently compiling JavaScript based on target browsers or runtime environments. Both versions depend on a suite of Babel plugins to transform modern JavaScript syntax into older, more widely supported equivalents. These plugins cover features from arrow functions and classes to destructuring and modules.
A key benefit for developers is the ability to specify target environments through browserslist, leading to smaller output bundles as only the necessary transformations are applied. By targeting specific browsers or Node.js versions, you avoid including transformations for features already supported in those environments.
Examining the dependencies and devDependencies, you will see no apparent changes between versions 1.3.2 and 1.3.3, indicating a very minor update. The core set of babel plugins and development tools remain consistent. It's possible any changes are related to documentation updates, testing, build processes or very minor bug fixes that do not affect the listed dependencies. Reviewing the detailed changelog for these specific versions is recommended to pinpoint the precise modifications, although the lack of dependency updates suggests the impact for developers is minimal. In practicality, upgrading from 1.3.2 to 1.3.3 should be seamless and risk-free.
All the vulnerabilities related to the version 1.3.3 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