vulnerability / NVI-00018332 / Revision 1
SurrealDB: Denial of Service via deep operator chains
GitHub lists this reviewed advisory for surrealdb. Published version ranges and source prerequisites are shown below; this is not an inspection of a visitor’s application.
This report has not inspected your inventory, configuration, deployed build, reachability or evidence. A catalog listing and a severity score do not establish exposure or compromise.
01 / Meaning
Why it matters
Published affected context helps an owner decide what evidence to gather. This report has not examined your application.
6.5 medium
GitHub source severity; exploitability and local consequence require separate evidence.
As of · GitHub Advisory Database
02 / Applicability
The affected context
Affected versions, configuration prerequisites and known exclusions are public. Confirm each one against the deployed service.
surrealdb
source listed>= 3.0.0, < 3.1.5
An authenticated user could crash a SurrealDB server with a single query containing a long chain of operators. Such a query — for example `RETURN 1 + 1 + 1 + ...` with tens of thousands of terms — is parsed into an expression tree one level deep per operator. Because the chain is flat and the pratt parser appends to it iteratively, the configured query- and object-recursion limits never fire, so the tree grows unbounded with the length of the query. The root cause: the over-deep tree is later walked recursively, one call per node, when it is dropped, formatted, or lowered for execution — overflowing the thread stack and aborting the process. ### Impact An authenticated user with query-execution privileges can crash a SurrealDB server with a single query containing a long chain of operators. The whole process aborts, denying service to every namespace and database on that instance until it is restarted. The crash occurs during query processing, before any data is read or written (availability only). ### Patches A patch introduces a dedicated expression-depth budget — `expr_recursion_limit`, sourced from `max_expression_parsing_depth` (default 128, configurable via `SURREAL_MAX
03 / Response
What to do next
- investigate
Identify the exact component and deployed version, examine the linked publisher’s conditions, and retain evidence of any mitigation.
Confirm current vendor support, compatibility and deployment evidence. This report has not tested a fix in your system. GitHub Advisory Database
A fixed release is not deployment evidence.
Check current vendor support and compatibility. After making a change, verify the deployed build and relevant runtime conditions. Keep the evidence, owner and time. An updated lockfile alone does not prove what is running.
04 / Limits
What this report cannot establish
- Customer inventory, deployment, reachability and exploitation have not been inspected.
05 / Provenance
Sources you can inspect
Each assertion retains its source. Mirrored records may repeat one underlying publisher; additional links are not independent corroboration.
- GHSA-jv2j-mqmw-xvv5 ↗
GitHub Advisory Database · vendor advisory
Observed . GitHub Advisory Database; CC-BY-4.0. Each advisory links its original attribution. Null normalizes fields.
Public revision history
Only published revisions appear here. Routine fetches do not create a material-change event.
- Revision 1 ·
First indexed by Null; source disclosure date is shown separately.