CVE-2026-59868: js-yaml: YAML merge-key chains can force quadratic CPU consumption in js-yaml
This is the same report as for v3/v4, but with lower severity, because in v5, merge is off by default
When merge keys (<<) are enabled, js-yaml can spend quadratic CPU time parsing a document whose size grows only linearly. The issue is triggered by a chain of mappings where each mapping merges the previous one:
a0: &a0 { k0: 0 }
a1: &a1 { <<: *a0, k1: 1 }
a2: &a2 { <<: *a1, k2: 2 }
a3: &a3 { <<: *a2, k3: 3 }
...
b: *aN
For each new mapping, the loader has to enumerate the keys inherited from the previous mapping. With N chained mappings, this results in roughly 1 + 2 + … + N merged-key visits, i.e., O(N^2) work for O(N) input size.
References
Code Behaviors & Features
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