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CVE-2026-40324 Detail

Description

Hot Chocolate is an open-source GraphQL server. Prior to versions 12.22.7, 13.9.16, 14.3.1, and 15.1.14, Hot Chocolate's recursive descent parser `Utf8GraphQLParser` has no recursion depth limit. A crafted GraphQL document with deeply nested selection sets, object values, list values, or list types can trigger a `StackOverflowException` on payloads as small as 40 KB. Because `StackOverflowException` is uncatchable in .NET (since .NET 2.0), the entire worker process is terminated immediately. All in-flight HTTP requests, background `IHostedService` tasks, and open WebSocket subscriptions on that worker are dropped. The orchestrator (Kubernetes, IIS, etc.) must restart the process. This occurs before any validation rules run — `MaxExecutionDepth`, complexity analyzers, persisted query allow-lists, and custom `IDocumentValidatorRule` implementations cannot intercept the crash because `Utf8GraphQLParser.Parse` is invoked before validation. The `MaxAllowedFields=2048` limit does not help because the crashing payloads contain very few fields. The fix in versions 12.22.7, 13.9.16, 14.3.1, and 15.1.14 adds a `MaxAllowedRecursionDepth` option to `ParserOptions` with a safe default, and enforces it across all recursive parser methods (`ParseSelectionSet`, `ParseValueLiteral`, `ParseObject`, `ParseList`, `ParseTypeReference`, etc.). When the limit is exceeded, a catchable `SyntaxException` is thrown instead of overflowing the stack. There is no application-level workaround. `StackOverflowException` cannot be caught in .NET. The only mitigation is to upgrade to a patched version. Operators can reduce (but not eliminate) risk by limiting HTTP request body size at the reverse proxy or load balancer layer, though the smallest crashing payload (40 KB) is well below most default body size limits and is highly compressible (~few hundred bytes via gzip).


Metrics

NVD enrichment efforts reference publicly available information to associate vector strings. CVSS information contributed by other sources is also displayed.
CVSS 4.0 Severity and Vector Strings:

NIST CVSS score
NIST: NVD
N/A
NVD assessment not yet provided.

References to Advisories, Solutions, and Tools

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URL Source(s) Tag(s)
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/commit/08c0caa42ca33c121bbed49d2db892e5bf6fb541 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/commit/4cbaf67d366f800fc1e484bc5c06dfcf27b45023 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/commit/b185eb276c9ee227bd44616ff113be7f01a66c69 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/commit/b9271e6a500484c002fd528dcd34d1a9b445480f GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/pull/9528 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/pull/9530 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/pull/9531 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/releases/tag/12.22.7 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/releases/tag/13.9.16 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/releases/tag/14.3.1 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/releases/tag/15.1.14 GitHub, Inc.
https://github.com/ChilliCream/graphql-platform/security/advisories/GHSA-qr3m-xw4c-jqw3 GitHub, Inc.

Weakness Enumeration

CWE-ID CWE Name Source
CWE-674 Uncontrolled Recursion GitHub, Inc.  

Change History

1 change records found show changes

Quick Info

CVE Dictionary Entry:
CVE-2026-40324
NVD Published Date:
04/17/2026
NVD Last Modified:
04/17/2026
Source:
GitHub, Inc.