Uncontrolled Recursion leading to Denial of Service in protobuf-javascript (google-protobuf)
Published Sep 17, 2026 · Updated Sep 17, 2026
google-protobuf contains an unbounded recursion when parsing unknown protobuf group fields. An attacker can send a small crafted payload of deeply nested START_GROUP wire bytes to any Node.js service that calls the generated deserializeBinary() API, causing a RangeError: Maximum call stack size exceeded and crashing the process. No authentication or prior knowledge of the schema is required.
Summary
What happened
google-protobuf contains an unbounded recursion when parsing unknown protobuf group fields. An attacker can send a small crafted payload of deeply nested START_GROUP wire bytes to any Node.js service that calls the generated deserializeBinary() API, causing a RangeError: Maximum call stack size exceeded and crashing the process. No authentication or prior knowledge of the schema is required.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-89418
- Published
- Sep 17, 2026
- Updated
- Sep 17, 2026
- Vendor
- WebM Project
- Product
- google-protobuf
- Classifications
- Unavailable
- Attack vector
- Unavailable
- Privileges
- Unavailable
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Sep 17, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Sep 17, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
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- Affected versionversion=All versions
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
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Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Activity data is delayed. The latest report is Sep 28, 2026.
Weakness, pattern, technique
No sourced classifications are available.
Public exploit references
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Technologies
Your stack
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