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Hugging Face Transformers Regular Expression Denial of Service (ReDoS) vulnerability

Moderate severity GitHub Reviewed Published Aug 6, 2025 to the GitHub Advisory Database • Updated Aug 6, 2025

Package

pip transformers (pip)

Affected versions

< 4.53.0

Patched versions

4.53.0

Description

A Regular Expression Denial of Service (ReDoS) vulnerability exists in the Hugging Face Transformers library, specifically in the convert_tf_weight_name_to_pt_weight_name() function. This function, responsible for converting TensorFlow weight names to PyTorch format, uses a regex pattern /[^/]*___([^/]*)/ that can be exploited to cause excessive CPU consumption through crafted input strings due to catastrophic backtracking. The vulnerability affects versions up to 4.51.3 and is fixed in version 4.53.0. This issue can lead to service disruption, resource exhaustion, and potential API service vulnerabilities, impacting model conversion processes between TensorFlow and PyTorch formats.

References

Published by the National Vulnerability Database Aug 6, 2025
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Aug 6, 2025
Reviewed Aug 6, 2025
Last updated Aug 6, 2025

Severity

Moderate

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
Low

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L

EPSS score

Exploit Prediction Scoring System (EPSS)

This score estimates the probability of this vulnerability being exploited within the next 30 days. Data provided by FIRST.
(17th percentile)

Weaknesses

Inefficient Regular Expression Complexity

The product uses a regular expression with an inefficient, possibly exponential worst-case computational complexity that consumes excessive CPU cycles. Learn more on MITRE.

CVE ID

CVE-2025-5197

GHSA ID

GHSA-9356-575x-2w9m

Source code

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