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ubuntu-cve-2023-23916
Vulnerability from osv_ubuntu
Published
2023-02-15 00:00
Modified
2026-04-22 07:45
Summary
Details

An allocation of resources without limits or throttling vulnerability exists in curl <v7.88.0 based on the "chained" HTTP compression algorithms, meaning that a server response can be compressed multiple times and potentially with differentalgorithms. The number of acceptable "links" in this "decompression chain" wascapped, but the cap was implemented on a per-header basis allowing a maliciousserver to insert a virtually unlimited number of compression steps simply byusing many headers. The use of such a decompression chain could result in a "malloc bomb", making curl end up spending enormous amounts of allocated heap memory, or trying to and returning out of memory errors.


{
  "affected": [
    {
      "ecosystem_specific": {
        "availability": "No subscription required",
        "binaries": [
          {
            "binary_name": "curl",
            "binary_version": "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.23"
          },
          {
            "binary_name": "libcurl3-gnutls",
            "binary_version": "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.23"
          },
          {
            "binary_name": "libcurl3-nss",
            "binary_version": "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.23"
          },
          {
            "binary_name": "libcurl4",
            "binary_version": "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.23"
          }
        ]
      },
      "package": {
        "ecosystem": "Ubuntu:18.04:LTS",
        "name": "curl",
        "purl": "pkg:deb/ubuntu/curl@7.58.0-2ubuntu3.23?arch=source\u0026distro=bionic"
      },
      "ranges": [
        {
          "events": [
            {
              "introduced": "0"
            },
            {
              "fixed": "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.23"
            }
          ],
          "type": "ECOSYSTEM"
        }
      ],
      "versions": [
        "7.55.1-1ubuntu2",
        "7.55.1-1ubuntu2.1",
        "7.57.0-1ubuntu1",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu1",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu2",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.1",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.2",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.3",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.5",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.6",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.7",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.8",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.9",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.10",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.12",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.13",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.14",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.15",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.16",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.17",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.18",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.19",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.20",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.21",
        "7.58.0-2ubuntu3.22"
      ]
    },
    {
      "ecosystem_specific": {
        "availability": "No subscription required",
        "binaries": [
          {
            "binary_name": "curl",
            "binary_version": "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.16"
          },
          {
            "binary_name": "libcurl3-gnutls",
            "binary_version": "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.16"
          },
          {
            "binary_name": "libcurl3-nss",
            "binary_version": "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.16"
          },
          {
            "binary_name": "libcurl4",
            "binary_version": "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.16"
          }
        ]
      },
      "package": {
        "ecosystem": "Ubuntu:20.04:LTS",
        "name": "curl",
        "purl": "pkg:deb/ubuntu/curl@7.68.0-1ubuntu2.16?arch=source\u0026distro=focal"
      },
      "ranges": [
        {
          "events": [
            {
              "introduced": "0"
            },
            {
              "fixed": "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.16"
            }
          ],
          "type": "ECOSYSTEM"
        }
      ],
      "versions": [
        "7.65.3-1ubuntu3",
        "7.65.3-1ubuntu4",
        "7.66.0-1ubuntu1",
        "7.67.0-2ubuntu1",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu1",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.1",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.2",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.4",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.5",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.6",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.7",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.10",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.11",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.12",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.13",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.14",
        "7.68.0-1ubuntu2.15"
      ]
    },
    {
      "ecosystem_specific": {
        "availability": "No subscription required",
        "binaries": [
          {
            "binary_name": "curl",
            "binary_version": "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.8"
          },
          {
            "binary_name": "libcurl3-gnutls",
            "binary_version": "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.8"
          },
          {
            "binary_name": "libcurl3-nss",
            "binary_version": "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.8"
          },
          {
            "binary_name": "libcurl4",
            "binary_version": "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.8"
          }
        ]
      },
      "package": {
        "ecosystem": "Ubuntu:22.04:LTS",
        "name": "curl",
        "purl": "pkg:deb/ubuntu/curl@7.81.0-1ubuntu1.8?arch=source\u0026distro=jammy"
      },
      "ranges": [
        {
          "events": [
            {
              "introduced": "0"
            },
            {
              "fixed": "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.8"
            }
          ],
          "type": "ECOSYSTEM"
        }
      ],
      "versions": [
        "7.74.0-1.3ubuntu2",
        "7.74.0-1.3ubuntu3",
        "7.80.0-3",
        "7.81.0-1",
        "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.1",
        "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.2",
        "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.3",
        "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.4",
        "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.6",
        "7.81.0-1ubuntu1.7"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "aliases": [],
  "details": "An allocation of resources without limits or throttling vulnerability exists in curl \u003cv7.88.0 based on the \"chained\" HTTP compression algorithms, meaning that a server response can be compressed multiple times and potentially with differentalgorithms. The number of acceptable \"links\" in this \"decompression chain\" wascapped, but the cap was implemented on a per-header basis allowing a maliciousserver to insert a virtually unlimited number of compression steps simply byusing many headers. The use of such a decompression chain could result in a \"malloc bomb\", making curl end up spending enormous amounts of allocated heap memory, or trying to and returning out of memory errors.",
  "id": "UBUNTU-CVE-2023-23916",
  "modified": "2026-04-22T07:45:15Z",
  "published": "2023-02-15T00:00:00Z",
  "references": [
    {
      "type": "REPORT",
      "url": "https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2023-23916"
    },
    {
      "type": "REPORT",
      "url": "https://curl.se/docs/CVE-2023-23916.html"
    },
    {
      "type": "ADVISORY",
      "url": "https://ubuntu.com/security/notices/USN-5891-1"
    },
    {
      "type": "REPORT",
      "url": "https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2023-23916"
    }
  ],
  "related": [
    "USN-5891-1"
  ],
  "schema_version": "1.7.0",
  "severity": [
    {
      "score": "CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H",
      "type": "CVSS_V3"
    },
    {
      "score": "CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H",
      "type": "CVSS_V3"
    },
    {
      "score": "medium",
      "type": "Ubuntu"
    }
  ],
  "upstream": [
    "CVE-2023-23916"
  ]
}



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