CVE-2023-38504: Sails DoS vulnerability for apps with sockets enabled

Severity: high (CVSS 7.5 v3.1)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.9% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2023-07-27 · updated 2026-06-17
Weakness: CWE-248

Description

Sails is a realtime MVC Framework for Node.js. In Sails apps prior to version 1.5.7,, an attacker can send a virtual request that will cause the node process to crash. This behavior was fixed in Sails v1.5.7. As a workaround, disable the sockets hook and remove the `sails.io.js` client.

Affected products

balderdashy sails: before 1.5.7 — fixed in 1.5.7

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: balderdashy sails 1.5.7. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

https://github.com/balderdashy/sails/commit/4a023dc5095a4b30fdc8535f705ed34cd22d2f7d
https://github.com/balderdashy/sails/pull/7287
https://github.com/balderdashy/sails/releases/tag/v1.5.7
https://github.com/balderdashy/sails/security/advisories/GHSA-gpw9-fwm8-7rx7
https://github.com/balderdashy/sails/commit/4a023dc5095a4b30fdc8535f705ed34cd22d2f7d
https://github.com/balderdashy/sails/pull/7287
https://github.com/balderdashy/sails/releases/tag/v1.5.7
https://github.com/balderdashy/sails/security/advisories/GHSA-gpw9-fwm8-7rx7

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