Potential memory exhaustion attack due to sparse slice deserialization

Exploitation

No confirmed exploitation recorded. Patch Next marks exploitation only from CISA KEV.

CVSS

7.5 · CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

EPSS

• CVE-2024-37298: 1.10% estimated exploitation activity in the next 30 days; percentile 65.61 (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-03). This is a model estimate, not proof of exploitation or customer exposure.

As published by the source; long descriptions are shortened.

Details Running schema.Decoder.Decode() on a struct that has a field of type []struct{...} opens it up to malicious attacks regarding memory allocations, taking advantage of the sparse slice functionality. For instance, in the Proof of Concept written below, someone can specify to set a field of the billionth element and it will allocate all other elements before it in the slice. In the local environment environment for my project, I was able to call an endpoint like /innocentendpoint?arr.10000000.X=1 and freeze my system from the memory allocation while parsing r.Form. I think this line is responsible for allocating the slice, although I haven't tested to make sure, so it's just an educated guess. Proof of Concept The following proof of concept works on both v1.2.0 and v1.2.1. I have not tested earlier versions. Impact Any use of schema.Decoder.Decode() on a struct with arrays of other structs could be vulnerable to this memory exhaustion vulnerability. There seems to be no possible…

Published by the source

1 Jul 2024, 20:35 UTC

Last modified by the source

5 Jul 2024, 21:29 UTC

Source last checked

26 Oct 2026, 15:04 UTC

1. Revision 1 · created · 26 Oct 2026

   Published from ghsa record GHSA-3669-72x9-r9p3

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# Patch Next advisory brief: CVE-2024-37298

Advisory: Potential memory exhaustion attack due to sparse slice deserialization
IDs: CVE-2024-37298, GHSA-3669-72x9-r9p3
Record: https://patchnext.com/advisories/cve-2024-37298 (revision 1, source checked 26 Oct 2026, 15:04 UTC)
Inventory: none attached. This brief comes from a public page and does not say whether any deployment is affected.
Severity: High (CVSS 7.5)
Exploitation: no confirmed exploitation recorded. Patch Next confirms exploitation only from CISA KEV.
Vendor response: Vendor fix available; fixed versions by package: github.com/gorilla/schema 1.4.1. A vendor fix does not mean a deployment is fixed.

## Affected components
- Go github.com/gorilla/schema: affected < 1.4.1; fixed in 1.4.1

## Suggested inspection (read-only)
- Go github.com/gorilla/schema: check the installed version with your package manager.

## Supported action
Upgrade each affected component to a fixed version on its release line. For a transitive dependency, upgrade the parent package or add an override or constraint, then regenerate the lockfile. Redeploy every environment that ran an affected version.

## Required regression checks
- Run the test suite and a production build.
- Exercise the features that depend on github.com/gorilla/schema.
- Repeat the inspection and confirm that only fixed versions remain installed.

## Rollback considerations
- Keep the previous lockfile and deployment artifact. Rolling back reinstates the vulnerable version, so apply any documented mitigation while you fix forward.

## Unresolved questions
- Which deployments run an affected version?
- Exploitation status can change. Check again before lowering the priority.
- Mark the work resolved only after the fixed version is verified in production.

## Sources
- Verified: https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-3669-72x9-r9p3 (GitHub-reviewed advisory GHSA-3669-72x9-r9p3 lists affected ranges: Go github.com/gorilla/schema >=0 <1.4.1)

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