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HIGH7.5

GHSA-3653-68v6-rq57

HAPI FHIR: ReDoS via FHIRPath matches()/replaceMatches() in FHIR Validator HTTP Endpoint

Quick fix

GHSA-3653-68v6-rq57 — ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2: upgrade to the fixed version with the command below.

# pom.xml: bump <version>6.9.7</version> for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2

Details

## Summary

All implementations of FHIRPathEngine accept arbitrary FHIRPath expressions and evaluate them without input validation. The FHIRPath functions `matches()`, `matchesFull()`, and `replaceMatches()` pass user-controlled regular expressions directly to Java's `Pattern.compile()` and `String.replaceAll()` without complexity checks or timeouts. An attacker can send a resource containing an evil regex pattern that causes catastrophic backtracking, exhausting system resources, and causing Denial-of-Service.

## Details

The vulnerability exists in regex execution in FHIRPathEngine implementations across multiple code modules. For example the org.hl7.fhir.r5 module:

**Entry point 1 — `FHIRPathEngine.java:5929` (R5 `funcMatches`):** ```java private List<Base> funcMatches(ExecutionContext context, List<Base> focus, ExpressionNode exp) { String sw = convertToString(swb); // attacker-controlled regex pattern // ... Pattern p = Pattern.compile("(?s)" + sw); // VULNERABLE: no complexity check Matcher m = p.matcher(st); // no timeout boolean ok = m.find(); ```

**Entry point 2 — `FHIRPathEngine.java:5951` (R5 `funcMatchesFull`):** ```java Pattern p = Pattern.compile("(?s)" + sw); // VULNERABLE: same pattern Matcher m = p.matcher(st); boolean ok = m.matches(); ```

**Entry point 3 — `FHIRPathEngine.java:5120` (R5 `funcReplaceMatches`):** ```java result.add(new StringType(convertToString(focus.get(0)) .replaceAll(regex, repl)).noExtensions()); // VULNERABLE: replaceAll uses Pattern internally ```

The same vulnerabilities exist in the dstu2, dstu2016may, dstu3, r4, and r4b modules, and the FHIRPathEngine is used in the validation module functionality.

**Why this is exploitable:** - No timeout mechanism covers FHIRPath evaluation — the `ValidationTimeout` class only protects `InstanceValidator` operations, not `evaluateFhirPath()` - Java's `Pattern.compile()` with a pattern like `(a+)+$` against input `"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!"` causes exponential backtracking (O(2^n) time complexity)

## Impact

- **CPU Exhaustion:** The exponential backtracking in Java's regex engine consumes 100% of a CPU core for the duration of the hang (effectively infinite for sufficiently long input strings) for callers of FHIRPathEngine.

Are you affected?

Enter the version of the package you're using.

Affected packages

Maven/ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2
Introduced in: 0Fixed in: 6.9.7
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>6.9.7</version> for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2
Maven/ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2016may
Introduced in: 0Fixed in: 6.9.7
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>6.9.7</version> for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2016may
Maven/ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu3
Introduced in: 0Fixed in: 6.9.7
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>6.9.7</version> for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu3
Maven/ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.r4
Introduced in: 0Fixed in: 6.9.7
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>6.9.7</version> for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.r4
Maven/ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.r4b
Introduced in: 0Fixed in: 6.9.7
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>6.9.7</version> for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.r4b
Maven/ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.r5
Introduced in: 0Fixed in: 6.9.7
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>6.9.7</version> for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.r5
Maven/ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.validation
Introduced in: 0Fixed in: 6.9.7
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>6.9.7</version> for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.validation
Maven/ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.validation.cli
Introduced in: 0Fixed in: 6.9.7
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>6.9.7</version> for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.validation.cli

References