tiny-secp256k1 allows for verify() bypass when running in bundled environment
Summary
A malicious JSON-stringifyable message can be made passing on verify(), when global Buffer is buffer package
Details
This affects only environments where require('buffer') is https://npmjs.com/buffer
E.g.: browser bundles, React Native apps, etc.
Buffer.isBuffer check can be bypassed, resulting in strange objects being accepted as message, and those messages could trick verify() into returning false-positive true values
v2.x is unaffected as it verifies input to be an actual Uint8Array instance
Such a message can be constructed for any already known message/signature pair There are some restrictions though (also depending on the known message/signature), but not very limiting, see PoC for example
https://github.com/bitcoinjs/tiny-secp256k1/pull/140 is a subtle fix for this
PoC
This code deliberately doesn't provide reencode for now, could be updated later
import { randomBytes } from 'crypto'
import tiny from 'tiny-secp256k1' // 1.1.6
// Random keypair
const privateKey = randomBytes(32)
const publicKey = tiny.pointFromScalar(privateKey)
const valid = Buffer.alloc(32).fill(255) // let's sign a static buffer
const signature = tiny.sign(valid, privateKey)
// Prevent processing any unverified data by fail-closed throwing
function verified(data, signature) {
if (!Buffer.isBuffer(data)) data = Buffer.from(data, 'hex')
if (!tiny.verify(data, publicKey, signature)) throw new Error('Signature invalid!')
return new Uint8Array(data)
}
function safeProcess(payload) {
const totally = JSON.parse(payload) // e.g. json over network
const message = verified(totally, signature)
console.log(message instanceof Uint8Array)
console.log(Buffer.from(message).toString('utf8'))
}
const payload = reencode(valid, "Secure contain protect")
safeProcess(payload)
Output (after being bundled):
true
Secure contain protect����
Impact
Malicious messages could crafted to be verified from a given known valid message/signature pair
Affected software
Click a technology to see all vulnerabilities affecting it.
| Platform | Package | Vulnerable versions | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|---|
| npm package | tiny-secp256k1 | < 1.1.7 | 1.1.7 |
References
- CVSS vector
CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:P- Weakness (CWE)
CWE-347- Platform
- npm
- Package
tiny-secp256k1- Disclosed
- 30.06.2025
- Updated
- 11.10.2026 10:22
Sources and licenses
OSV / GitHub Advisory Database - GHSA-5vhg-9xg4-cv9m - CC BY 4.0
Vulnerability history: tiny-secp256k1
All published vulnerabilities of this package (npm package), newest first. Shows whether this is a one-off slip or a package that needs watching.
- Total entries
- 2
- First → latest
- 06.2025 06.2025
- Without a fix
- 0
- Exploited in attacks
- 0
Severity breakdown
- High 2
Disclosures per year
- 2025: 2
- 2026: 0
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