Description
The npm package "tar" (aka node-tar) before versions 6.1.1, 5.0.6, 4.4.14, and 3.3.2 has a arbitrary File Creation/Overwrite vulnerability due to insufficient absolute path sanitization. node-tar aims to prevent extraction of absolute file paths by turning absolute paths into relative paths when the `preservePaths` flag is not set to `true`. This is achieved by stripping the absolute path root from any absolute file paths contained in a tar file. For example `/home/user/.bashrc` would turn into `home/user/.bashrc`. This logic was insufficient when file paths contained repeated path roots such as `////home/user/.bashrc`. `node-tar` would only strip a single path root from such paths. When given an absolute file path with repeating path roots, the resulting path (e.g. `///home/user/.bashrc`) would still resolve to an absolute path, thus allowing arbitrary file creation and overwrite. This issue was addressed in releases 3.2.2, 4.4.14, 5.0.6 and 6.1.1. Users may work around this vulnerability without upgrading by creating a custom `onentry` method which sanitizes the `entry.path` or a `filter` method which removes entries with absolute paths. See referenced GitHub Advisory for details. Be aware of CVE-2021-32803 which fixes a similar bug in later versions of tar.
Remediation
References
https://www.npmjs.com/advisories/1770
https://github.com/npm/node-tar/commit/1f036ca23f64a547bdd6c79c1a44bc62e8115da4
https://github.com/npm/node-tar/security/advisories/GHSA-3jfq-g458-7qm9
https://www.npmjs.com/package/tar
https://www.oracle.com/security-alerts/cpuoct2021.html
https://cert-portal.siemens.com/productcert/pdf/ssa-389290.pdf
Related Vulnerabilities
CVE-2021-23335 Vulnerability in npm package is-user-valid
CVE-2016-10562 Vulnerability in npm package iedriver
CVE-2021-4329 Vulnerability in maven package org.webjars.npm:json-logic-js
CVE-2017-16202 Vulnerability in npm package cofeescript
CVE-2016-1000352 Vulnerability in maven package org.bouncycastle:bcprov-jdk15on