CVE-2026-33916 (GCVE-0-2026-33916)
Vulnerability from cvelistv5 – Published: 2026-03-27 21:00 – Updated: 2026-03-30 15:41
VLAI
EPSS
VEX
Title
Handlebars.js has Prototype Pollution Leading to XSS through Partial Template Injection
Summary
Handlebars provides the power necessary to let users build semantic templates. In versions 4.0.0 through 4.7.8, `resolvePartial()` in the Handlebars runtime resolves partial names via a plain property lookup on `options.partials` without guarding against prototype-chain traversal. When `Object.prototype` has been polluted with a string value whose key matches a partial reference in a template, the polluted string is used as the partial body and rendered without HTML escaping, resulting in reflected or stored XSS. Version 4.7.9 fixes the issue. Some workarounds are available. Apply `Object.freeze(Object.prototype)` early in application startup to prevent prototype pollution. Note: this may break other libraries, and/or use the Handlebars runtime-only build (`handlebars/runtime`), which does not compile templates and reduces the attack surface.
Severity
4.7 (Medium)
SSVC
Exploitation: poc
Automatable: no
Technical Impact: partial
CISA Coordinator · CISA-ADP (v2.0.3)
Decision recorded 2026-03-30 15:41 UTC
CWE
Assigner
References
3 references
| URL | Tags |
|---|---|
| https://github.com/handlebars-lang/handlebars.js/… | x_refsource_CONFIRM |
| https://github.com/handlebars-lang/handlebars.js/… | x_refsource_MISC |
| https://github.com/handlebars-lang/handlebars.js/… | x_refsource_MISC |
Impacted products
1 product
| Vendor | Product | Version | CPE status | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| handlebars-lang | handlebars.js |
Affected:
>= 4.0.0, < 4.7.9
|
guessed |
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Experimental. This forecast is provided for visualization only and may change without notice. Do not use it for operational decisions.
Forecast uses a logistic model when the trend is rising, or an exponential decay model when the trend is falling. Fitted via linearized least squares.
Sightings
| Author | Source | Type | Date | Other |
|---|
Nomenclature
- Seen: The vulnerability was mentioned, discussed, or observed by the user.
- Confirmed: The vulnerability has been validated from an analyst's perspective.
- Published Proof of Concept: A public proof of concept is available for this vulnerability.
- Exploited: The vulnerability was observed as exploited by the user who reported the sighting.
- Patched: The vulnerability was observed as successfully patched by the user who reported the sighting.
- Not exploited: The vulnerability was not observed as exploited by the user who reported the sighting.
- Not confirmed: The user expressed doubt about the validity of the vulnerability.
- Not patched: The vulnerability was not observed as successfully patched by the user who reported the sighting.
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The MITRE ATT&CK techniques below are AI-generated suggestions, inferred from the description of the
vulnerability by the CIRCL/vulnerability-attack-technique-classification-roberta-base
model, served locally by ML-Gateway.
They have not been verified by an analyst and are provided for guidance only.
The approach is described in our paper Mapping CVEs to MITRE ATT&CK Techniques: A Curated Gold-Set Classifier and the Limits of LLM-Assisted Label Expansion.
Browse all ATT&CK techniques and the vulnerabilities related to each.
The approach is described in our paper Mapping CVEs to MITRE ATT&CK Techniques: A Curated Gold-Set Classifier and the Limits of LLM-Assisted Label Expansion.
Browse all ATT&CK techniques and the vulnerabilities related to each.
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Related by attack behaviour
Vulnerabilities whose description is nearest to this one in the vector space of the CIRCL/vulnerability-attack-technique-biencoder model. This is a similarity search over the bi-encoder space (plain cosine), not a classification, and it has no measured accuracy.
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