Resource exhaustion in Helm

CVE-2025-55199

Helm is a package manager for Charts for Kubernetes. Prior to version 3.18.5, it is possible to craft a JSON Schema file in a manner which could cause Helm to use all available memory and have an out of memory (OOM) termination. This issue has been resolved in Helm 3.18.5. A workaround involves ensuring all Helm charts that are being loaded into Helm do not have any reference of $ref pointing to /dev/zero.

Published · last modified .

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 6.5 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.003 (25.6th percentile), scored .

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 26th percentile — 25.6% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS trend (30 days)EPSS over the last 30 days for CVE-2025-55199: held from 0.003 to 0.003.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.003 · newest: 0.003 · change: 0.000

Affected products

  • Helm — versions < 3.18.5

Weakness classification (CWE)

Public proof-of-concept exploits

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2025-55199?
CVE-2025-55199 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Helm, classified under Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling. CVSS score: 6.5/10. Published 2025-08-14.
How severe is CVE-2025-55199?
Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 6.5 out of 10.
Is CVE-2025-55199 known to be exploited?
1 public proof-of-concept repositories are indexed. Not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.