HomeCVE Intelligence › CVE-2026-43998
CVSS 8.5 HIGH Vulnerability

CVE-2026-43998: vm2 has a NodeVM require.root bypass via symlink traversal that allows sandbox escape

Summary NodeVM's require.root path restriction can be bypassed using filesystem symlinks, allowing sandboxed code to load modules from outside the allowed root directory in host context. Because path validation uses pat…

8.5CVSS Score
HIGHSeverity
NOCISA KEV
VulnerabilityImpact Type

📋 Vulnerability Details

CVE IDCVE-2026-43998
Vendornpm
Affected Productvm2
Vulnerability TypeVulnerability
CVSS Score8.5 (HIGH)
Actively Exploited❌ No known exploitation
Patch StatusSee Vendor Advisory →
Reported ByCYBERDUDEBIVASH SENTINEL APEX Intelligence (via github_advisories)

🔬 Technical Analysis

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Summary

NodeVM's require.root path restriction can be bypassed using filesystem symlinks, allowing sandboxed code to load modules from outside the allowed root directory in host context. Because path validation uses path.resolve() (which does not dereference symlinks) but module loading uses Node's native require() (which does), an attacker can load arbitrary host-realm modules and achieve remote code execution.

Severity

Attack Complexity: High — requires symlinks inside the allowed root that point outside it; common with pnpm, npm workspaces, and npm link but not guaranteed

High (CVSS 3.1: 8.5) CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H - Attack Vector: Network — sandboxed code is typically received from external sources (user-submitted scripts, plugin code)

📚 Advisory References

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