LlamaIndex has an XML Entity Expansion vulnerability in its sitemap parser
Date: 2025-07
Affected: pip/llama-index-readers-papers
Attack vector: dos
Category: vulnerability-disclosure
Severity: High
CVE: CVE-2025-3225
CWE: CWE-776
CVSS: 7.5 (CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H)

An XML Entity Expansion vulnerability, also known as a 'billion laughs' attack, exists in the sitemap parser of the run-llama/llama_index repository, specifically affecting the Papers Loaders package before version 0.3.2 (in llama-index v0.10.0 and above through v0.12.29). This vulnerability allows an attacker to supply a malicious Sitemap XML, leading to a Denial of Service (DoS) by exhausting system memory and potentially causing a system crash. The issue is resolved in version 0.3.2 (in llama-index 0.12.29).


Mitigations:

Architectural layers (MAESTRO):