Cpanel::JSON::XS versions from 4.33 before 4.80 for Perl miss duplicate non-ASCII bare keys, allowing type confusion under dupkeys_as_arrayref in decode_hv

Overview

Cpanel::JSON::XS versions from 4.33 before 4.80 for Perl miss duplicate non-ASCII bare keys, allowing type confusion under dupkeys_as_arrayref in decode_hv.

With allow_barekey, which relaxed enables, a bare key containing a non-ASCII byte is stored as UTF-8 but looked up as raw bytes, so a repeated key escapes the duplicate-key check and replaces the earlier value.

From 4.41, under dupkeys_as_arrayref, a bare repeat replaces the array that collects a key's values with a plain value, and the next quoted repeat pushes onto that value as if it were an array. A JSON integer there is dereferenced as a pointer.

Untrusted JSON decoded with relaxed and dupkeys_as_arrayref can crash the process or dereference an address chosen by a JSON number.

Affected

• Cpanel-JSON-XS >= 4.33 < 4.80

Remediation

Upgrade to Cpanel-JSON-XS 4.80 or later.