CVE-2020-23469Public exploitNetwork attack vector

Editor hang via catastrophic regex backtracking

Published Sep 22, 2021 · Updated Aug 4, 2024

Regular expression denial of service in gmate 0.12+bionic allows attackers to hang gedit through crafted plugin input. Two gedit3 code paths apply ambiguous, nested-quantifier regular expressions to find-result markup and zencoding tag text, causing excessive backtracking on crafted nonmatches. Triggering requires a crafted string to reach one of those plugin parsers; the upstream report demonstrates prolonged matching but does not establish a network delivery path.

CVSS severity7.5
High
EPSS probability1.22%
Next 30 days · Sep 16, 2026
Known exploitationUnconfirmed
Based on sourced intelligence
Hinoki checkNot available
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Summary

What happened

Regular expression denial of service in gmate 0.12+bionic allows attackers to hang gedit through crafted plugin input. Two gedit3 code paths apply ambiguous, nested-quantifier regular expressions to find-result markup and zencoding tag text, causing excessive backtracking on crafted nonmatches. Triggering requires a crafted string to reach one of those plugin parsers; the upstream report demonstrates prolonged matching but does not establish a network delivery path.

The record

CVE
CVE-2020-23469
Published
Sep 22, 2021
Updated
Aug 4, 2024
Vendor
Unknown vendor
Product
Unknown product
Classifications
CWE-1333, CAPEC-492, T1499.004
Attack vector
network
Privileges
unauthenticated

Timeline

How it unfolded

  1. Sep 22, 2021CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
  2. Aug 4, 2024Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.

Exploitability

Present is not the same as exploitable

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Is a vulnerable build present?

Affected buildAffected product and version details are unavailable.

What conditions does exploitation require?

Attack vectornetwork
Required privilegesunauthenticated

What is affected?

Affected products and versions are unavailable in this record.

Published CVSS scores

7.5NVDCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
5.0NVDAV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P

CVSS describes severity. EPSS estimates exploitation probability.

Attacks

What attackers are doing with it

Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.

Daily unique IPsNo honeypot observations are available for this CVE in the selected window.

No observations available

Sep 9, 2026Sep 15, 2026
Latest reporting daySep 15, 2026
Latest daily unique IPsUnavailable
Prior 30-day averageUnavailable
SourceShadowserver honeypots (KEV)
Vectornetwork
Privilegesunauthenticated
Known exploitationUnconfirmed
Public exploitPublished

Weakness, pattern, technique

CWE-1333Inefficient Regular Expression Complexity
CAPEC-492Regular Expression Exponential Blowup
T1499.004Application or System Exploitation

Public exploit references

Labels summarize the accepted research assessment. They do not indicate a test against your environment.

Technologies

Your stack

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Your stack

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