{
  "affected": [
    {
      "database_specific": {
        "last_known_affected_version_range": "\u003c= 14.1.1"
      },
      "package": {
        "ecosystem": "npm",
        "name": "markdown-it"
      },
      "ranges": [
        {
          "events": [
            {
              "introduced": "0"
            },
            {
              "fixed": "14.2.0"
            }
          ],
          "type": "ECOSYSTEM"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "aliases": [
    "CVE-2026-48988"
  ],
  "database_specific": {
    "cwe_ids": [
      "CWE-400",
      "CWE-407"
    ],
    "github_reviewed": true,
    "github_reviewed_at": "2026-06-15T20:41:06Z",
    "nvd_published_at": null,
    "severity": "MODERATE"
  },
  "details": "### Summary\n\nA quadratic time complexity vulnerability exists in markdown-it\u0027s smartquotes rule (enabled via the `typographer: true` option). An attacker can craft a markdown input consisting of consecutive quotation marks that causes the parser to consume excessive CPU time, leading to denial of service.\n\n### Details\n\nThe vulnerability is in the `replaceAt()` helper function used by the smartquotes rule in `lib/rules_core/smartquotes.mjs`:\n\n```javascript\nfunction replaceAt (str, index, ch) {\n  return str.slice(0, index) + ch + str.slice(index + 1)\n}\n```\n\nWhen markdown-it processes a text token containing many quotation marks (either `\"` or `\u0027`) with `typographer: true`, the smartquotes rule iterates through each quote character and calls `replaceAt()` to substitute it with a typographic (curly) quote. Each call to `replaceAt()` creates three new string slices and concatenates them, which is an O(n) operation where n is the length of the string.\n\nSince this is called once per quote character in the token, and there are n quote characters, the total time complexity becomes O(n^2).\n\nThe root cause is that the smartquotes rule modifies `token.content` in place using string slicing rather than building the result incrementally. The `process_inlines()` function (line 14) processes each quote in the text token, and for matching quote pairs, calls `replaceAt()` on both the opening and closing token\u0027s content (lines 151-152). When the entire input is a single text token of quote characters, this results in quadratic behavior.\n\n### PoC\n\n```javascript\nconst md = require(\u0027markdown-it\u0027);\nconst instance = md({ typographer: true });\n\n// 160,000 consecutive double-quote characters\nconst payload = \u0027\"\u0027.repeat(160000);\n\nconsole.time(\u0027render\u0027);\ninstance.render(payload);\nconsole.timeEnd(\u0027render\u0027);\n// Output: render: ~21000ms (21 seconds)\n\n// Compare with typographer disabled:\nconst safe = md({ typographer: false });\nconsole.time(\u0027render-safe\u0027);\nsafe.render(payload);\nconsole.timeEnd(\u0027render-safe\u0027);\n// Output: render-safe: ~8ms\n```\n\nMeasured timing on a modern system:\n- 10,000 quotes: ~19ms\n- 20,000 quotes: ~51ms\n- 40,000 quotes: ~212ms\n- 80,000 quotes: ~5,430ms\n- 160,000 quotes: ~21,198ms\n\nThe scaling is clearly superlinear (quadratic), with the 80K-\u003e160K step showing a ~3.9x increase for a 2x input increase, consistent with O(n^2).\n\n### Impact\n\nApplications that render user-supplied markdown with `typographer: true` are vulnerable to denial of service. An attacker can submit a relatively small payload (160KB of quote characters) that causes the server to spend over 21 seconds processing a single request. Repeated submissions can exhaust server CPU resources and prevent legitimate users from being served.\n\nThe impact is mitigated by the fact that the `typographer` option defaults to `false` and must be explicitly enabled. However, the typographer feature is commonly enabled in production applications that want smart typography, and the markdown-it documentation prominently suggests enabling it.\n\nA suggested fix would be to replace the `replaceAt()` approach with an array-based or StringBuilder-style approach that collects all replacements and applies them in a single pass, reducing the time complexity to O(n).",
  "id": "GHSA-6v5v-wf23-fmfq",
  "modified": "2026-06-15T20:41:06Z",
  "published": "2026-06-15T20:41:06Z",
  "references": [
    {
      "type": "WEB",
      "url": "https://github.com/markdown-it/markdown-it/security/advisories/GHSA-6v5v-wf23-fmfq"
    },
    {
      "type": "PACKAGE",
      "url": "https://github.com/markdown-it/markdown-it"
    }
  ],
  "schema_version": "1.4.0",
  "severity": [
    {
      "score": "CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L",
      "type": "CVSS_V3"
    }
  ],
  "summary": "markdown-it: Quadratic complexity DoS in smartquotes rule via replaceAt string operations"
}