Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2021-32640

medium Nessus Plugin ID 258859

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Synopsis

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed with a vulnerability that the vendor indicates will not be patched.

Description

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed that are impacted by a vulnerability without a vendor supplied patch available.

- ws is an open source WebSocket client and server library for Node.js. A specially crafted value of the `Sec-Websocket-Protocol` header can be used to significantly slow down a ws server. The vulnerability has been fixed in [email protected] (https://github.com/websockets/ws/commit/00c425ec77993773d823f018f64a5c44e17023ff).
In vulnerable versions of ws, the issue can be mitigated by reducing the maximum allowed length of the request headers using the [`--max-http-header- size=size`](https://nodejs.org/api/cli.html#cli_max_http_header_size_size) and/or the [`maxHeaderSize`](https://nodejs.org/api/http.html#http_http_createserver_options_requestlistener) options. (CVE-2021-32640)

Note that Nessus relies on the presence of the package as reported by the vendor.

Solution

There is no known solution at this time.

Plugin Details

Severity: Medium

ID: 258859

File Name: unpatched_CVE_2021_32640.nasl

Version: 1.1

Type: local

Agent: unix

Family: Misc.

Published: 8/30/2025

Updated: 8/30/2025

Supported Sensors: Agentless Assessment, Frictionless Assessment Agent, Frictionless Assessment AWS, Frictionless Assessment Azure, Nessus Agent, Nessus

Risk Information

VPR

Risk Factor: Low

Score: 2.2

CVSS v2

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 5

Temporal Score: 3.9

Vector: CVSS2#AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P

CVSS Score Source: CVE-2021-32640

CVSS v3

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 5.3

Temporal Score: 4.8

Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L

Temporal Vector: CVSS:3.0/E:P/RL:O/RC:C

Vulnerability Information

CPE: cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:16.04:-:lts, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:22.04:-:lts, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:18.04:-:lts, p-cpe:/a:canonical:ubuntu_linux:node-ws, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:20.04:-:lts

Required KB Items: Host/cpu, Host/local_checks_enabled, global_settings/vendor_unpatched, Host/OS/identifier

Exploit Available: true

Exploit Ease: Exploits are available

Vulnerability Publication Date: 5/25/2021

Reference Information

CVE: CVE-2021-32640

Detections

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