CVE-2026-48591

MEDIUM

Stored XSS via unescaped HTML attribute values in earmark

Title source: cna
STIX 2.1

Description

Improper Neutralization of Script in Attributes in a Web Page vulnerability in pragdave earmark allows stored cross-site scripting via unescaped HTML attribute values. 'Elixir.Earmark.Transform':_make_att1/2 in lib/earmark/transform.ex splices attribute values verbatim between two literal " bytes: [" ", name, "=\"", value, "\""]. Text nodes are routed through the existing escape function which encodes " as &quot;, but attribute values never visit that path. A markdown link whose URL or title contains a bare " closes the attribute early and lets the trailing bytes be parsed by the browser as fresh HTML attributes. For example, [click](http://example.com/?a=x" onerror="alert(1)) renders as <a href="http://example.com/?a=x" onerror="alert(1)">click</a>, executing arbitrary JavaScript in the victim's browser. The earmark library is no longer maintained and has been retired on Hex. No patched version will be released. All releases from 1.4.1 onward are affected, and users should migrate to a maintained Markdown library such as MDEx. This issue affects earmark from 1.4.1 onward.

References (2)

Core 2
Core References
Related, Third Party Advisory related third-party-advisory
https://cna.erlef.org/cves/CVE-2026-48591.html

Scores

CVSS v4 4.8
EPSS 0.0013
EPSS Percentile 3.2%
CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:P/VC:L/VI:L/VA:N/SC:L/SI:L/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X

CISA SSVC

Vulnrichment
Exploitation none
Automatable no
Technical Impact partial

Details

CWE
CWE-83
Status published
Products (3)
Hex/earmark 1.4.1 - 1.5.0-pre1Hex
pragdave/earmark 1.4.1
pragdave/earmark 8236a0570bd894b50e360da08131ec3294c20799
Published Jun 17, 2026
Tracked Since Jun 17, 2026