CVE-2026-33671
Jonschlinkert Picomatch ≤ 2.3.2
Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:HSummary
CVE-2026-33671 is a high-severity Inefficient Regular Expression Complexity (CWE-1333) vulnerability in Jonschlinkert Picomatch. Its CVSS base score is 7.5 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Endpoint Denial of Service (T1499); ranked at the 33th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to SA-11 (Developer Testing and Evaluation) and SA-15 (Development Process, Standards, and Tools) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
Deeper analysis AI-assisted summary
Synthesised by an AI model from the NVD description and linked references — a reading aid, not an authoritative source.
Picomatch, a JavaScript glob matcher library, is affected by CVE-2026-33671, a Regular Expression Denial of Service (ReDoS) vulnerability rated at CVSS 7.5 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H) and mapped to CWE-1333. Versions prior to 4.0.4, 3.0.2, and 2.3.2 are vulnerable when processing crafted extglob patterns, such as those using quantifiers like +() and *() combined with overlapping alternatives or nested extglobs. These patterns compile into regular expressions that exhibit catastrophic backtracking on non-matching input, leading to excessive resource consumption.
An attacker can exploit this vulnerability in applications that accept untrusted user-supplied glob patterns and pass them to picomatch for compilation or matching. No privileges are required, enabling remote exploitation over the network with low complexity. Successful exploitation causes excessive CPU usage and blocks the Node.js event loop, resulting in denial of service. Applications using only trusted, developer-controlled patterns face lower risk.
The GitHub security advisory (GHSA-c2c7-rcm5-vvqj) and related commit recommend upgrading to picomatch 4.0.4, 3.0.2, or 2.3.2 or later, based on the supported release line. If upgrading is not feasible, mitigations include avoiding untrusted glob patterns, disabling extglob support with the noextglob: true option, rejecting or sanitizing patterns with nested extglobs or quantifiers like +() and *(), enforcing strict allowlists for pattern syntax, isolating matching in workers or separate processes with resource limits, and applying request throttling plus input validation for glob-accepting endpoints.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2026-16436
Vulnerability Data
Picomatch is a glob matcher written JavaScript. Versions prior to 4.0.4, 3.0.2, and 2.3.2 are vulnerable to Regular Expression Denial of Service (ReDoS) when processing crafted extglob patterns. Certain patterns using extglob quantifiers such as `+()` and `*()`, especially when…
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combined with overlapping alternatives or nested extglobs, are compiled into regular expressions that can exhibit catastrophic backtracking on non-matching input. Applications are impacted when they allow untrusted users to supply glob patterns that are passed to `picomatch` for compilation or matching. In those cases, an attacker can cause excessive CPU consumption and block the Node.js event loop, resulting in a denial of service. Applications that only use trusted, developer-controlled glob patterns are much less likely to be exposed in a security-relevant way. This issue is fixed in picomatch 4.0.4, 3.0.2 and 2.3.2. Users should upgrade to one of these versions or later, depending on their supported release line. If upgrading is not immediately possible, avoid passing untrusted glob patterns to `picomatch`. Possible mitigations include disabling extglob support for untrusted patterns by using `noextglob: true`, rejecting or sanitizing patterns containing nested extglobs or extglob quantifiers such as `+()` and `*()`, enforcing strict allowlists for accepted pattern syntax, running matching in an isolated worker or separate process with time and resource limits, and applying application-level request throttling and input validation for any endpoint that accepts glob patterns.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Developer testing and evaluation can discover inefficient regex patterns via performance or static analysis.
Development standards and tools can require safe regex construction and forbid known exponential patterns.
Denial-of-service protections limit resource exhaustion caused by expensive regex evaluation.
Input validation can constrain data that would otherwise trigger worst-case regex complexity.
Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI
Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.
Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI
Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.
Security testing can detect and reject regex patterns with exponential worst-case complexity.
Secure development lifecycle mandates review of algorithmic efficiency, directly addressing ReDoS-prone regex.
Application security requirements can specify input-validation rules that limit regex complexity.
Secure architecture principles encourage avoidance of computationally expensive constructs such as catastrophic backtracking.
Secure coding standards explicitly prohibit or limit the use of inefficient regular expressions.