CVE-2025-24015
Deno's AES GCM authentication tags are not verified
Impact
### Summary This affects AES-256-GCM and AES-128-GCM in Deno, introduced by commit [0d1beed](https://github.com/denoland/deno/commit/0d1beed). Specifically, the authentication tag is not being validated. This means tampered ciphertexts or incorrect keys might not be detected, which breaks the guarantees expected from AES-GCM. Older versions of Deno correctly threw errors in such cases, as does Node.js. Without authentication tag verification, AES-GCM degrades to essentially CTR mode, removing integrity protection. Authenticated data set with set_aad is also affected, as it is incorporated into the GCM hash (ghash) but this too is not validated, rendering AAD checks ineffective. ### PoC ```ts import { Buffer } from "node:buffer"; import { createCipheriv, createDecipheriv, randomBytes, scrypt, } from "node:crypto"; type Encrypted = { salt: string; iv: string; enc: string; authTag: string; }; const deriveKey = (key: string, salt: Buffer) => new Promise<Buffer>((res, rej) => scrypt(key, salt, 32, (err, k) => { if (err) rej(err); else res(k); }) ); async function encrypt(text: string, key: string): Promise<Encrypted> { const salt = randomBytes(32); const k = await deriveKey(key, salt); const iv = randomBytes(16); const enc = createCipheriv("aes-256-gcm", k, iv); const ciphertext = enc.update(text, "binary", "binary") + enc.final("binary"); return { salt: salt.toString("binary"), iv: iv.toString("binary"), enc: ciphertext, authTag: enc.getAuthTag().toString("binary"), }; } async function decrypt(enc: Encrypted, key: string) { const k = await deriveKey(key, Buffer.from(enc.salt, "binary")); const dec = createDecipheriv("aes-256-gcm", k, Buffer.from(enc.iv, "binary")); const out = dec.update(enc.enc, "binary", "binary"); dec.setAuthTag(Buffer.from(enc.authTag, "binary")); return out + dec.final("binary"); } const test = await encrypt("abcdefghi", "key"); test.enc = ""; console.log(await decrypt(test, "")); // no error ``` ### Impact While discovered through experimentation, authentication failures that should raise errors may be silently ignored.
Affected packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Affected | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|---|
| rust | deno | >= 1.46.0, < 2.1.7 | 2.1.7 |
| rust | deno_node | >= 0.102.0, < 0.125.0 | 0.125.0 |
Affected products
| Vendor | Product | Affected versions |
|---|---|---|
| Deno | Deno | from 1.46.0 before 2.1.7 |
Weakness classification
References
- NVD record
- CVE.org record
- GitHub advisory
- https://github.com/denoland/deno/commit/0d1beed
- https://github.com/denoland/deno/commit/4f27d7cdc02e3edfb9d36275341fb8185d6e99ed
- https://github.com/denoland/deno/commit/a4003a5292bd0affefad3ecb24a8732886900f67
- https://github.com/denoland/deno/security/advisories/GHSA-2x3r-hwv5-p32x
- https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-2x3r-hwv5-p32x
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2025-24015
- https://github.com/denoland/deno/commit/0d1beed2e3633d71d5e288e0382b85be361ec13d