Summary
to_markdown() is vulnerable when serializing attacker-controlled <pre> content. The <pre> handler emits a fixed three-backtick fenced code block, but writes decoded text content into that fence without choosing a delimiter longer than any backtick run inside the content.
An attacker can place backticks and HTML-like text inside a sanitized <pre> element so that the generated Markdown closes the fence early and leaves raw HTML outside the code block. When that Markdown is rendered by a CommonMark/GFM-style renderer that allows raw HTML, the HTML executes.
This is a bypass of the v1.12.0 Markdown hardening. That fix escaped HTML-significant characters for regular text nodes, but <pre> uses a separate serialization path and does not apply the same protection.
Details
The vulnerable <pre> Markdown path:
- extracts decoded text from the
<pre> subtree
- opens a fenced block with a fixed delimiter of ``````
- writes the decoded text directly into the output
- closes with another fixed ``````
Because the fence length is fixed, attacker-controlled content containing a backtick run of length 3 or more can terminate the code block. If the content also contains decoded HTML-like text such as <img ...>, that text appears outside the fence in the resulting Markdown and is treated as raw HTML by downstream Markdown renderers.
The issue is not that HTML-like text appears inside code blocks. The issue is that the serializer allows attacker-controlled <pre> text to break out of the fixed fence.
Reproduction
from justhtml import JustHTML
payload = "<pre>```\n<img src=x onerror=alert(1)></pre>"
doc = JustHTML(payload, fragment=True) # default sanitize=True
print(doc.to_html(pretty=False))
# <pre>```
# <img src=x onerror=alert(1)></pre>
print(doc.to_markdown())
# ```
# ```
# <img src=x onerror=alert(1)>
# ```
Rendered as CommonMark/GFM-style Markdown, that output is interpreted as:
- Line 1 opens a fenced code block
- Line 2 closes it
- Line 3 is raw HTML outside the fence
- Line 4 opens a new fence
Impact
Applications that treat JustHTML(..., sanitize=True).to_markdown() output as safe for direct rendering in Markdown contexts may be exposed to XSS, depending on the downstream Markdown renderer's raw-HTML handling.
Root Cause
The <pre> Markdown serializer uses a fixed fence instead of selecting a delimiter longer than the longest backtick run in the content.
Fix
When serializing <pre> content to Markdown, choose a fence length longer than any backtick run present in the code block content, with a minimum length of 3.
References
AlfinJ0se Reporter
Summary
to_markdown()is vulnerable when serializing attacker-controlled<pre>content. The<pre>handler emits a fixed three-backtick fenced code block, but writes decoded text content into that fence without choosing a delimiter longer than any backtick run inside the content.An attacker can place backticks and HTML-like text inside a sanitized
<pre>element so that the generated Markdown closes the fence early and leaves raw HTML outside the code block. When that Markdown is rendered by a CommonMark/GFM-style renderer that allows raw HTML, the HTML executes.This is a bypass of the v1.12.0 Markdown hardening. That fix escaped HTML-significant characters for regular text nodes, but
<pre>uses a separate serialization path and does not apply the same protection.Details
The vulnerable
<pre>Markdown path:<pre>subtreeBecause the fence length is fixed, attacker-controlled content containing a backtick run of length 3 or more can terminate the code block. If the content also contains decoded HTML-like text such as
<img ...>, that text appears outside the fence in the resulting Markdown and is treated as raw HTML by downstream Markdown renderers.The issue is not that HTML-like text appears inside code blocks. The issue is that the serializer allows attacker-controlled
<pre>text to break out of the fixed fence.Reproduction
Rendered as CommonMark/GFM-style Markdown, that output is interpreted as:
Impact
Applications that treat
JustHTML(..., sanitize=True).to_markdown()output as safe for direct rendering in Markdown contexts may be exposed to XSS, depending on the downstream Markdown renderer's raw-HTML handling.Root Cause
The
<pre>Markdown serializer uses a fixed fence instead of selecting a delimiter longer than the longest backtick run in the content.Fix
When serializing
<pre>content to Markdown, choose a fence length longer than any backtick run present in the code block content, with a minimum length of 3.References