Service crash via unbounded multipart parsing
Published May 2, 2024 · Updated Feb 13, 2025
Resource exhaustion in Email::MIME before 1.954 allows remote attackers to crash email-processing services with multipart messages. Email::MIME->new recursively constructs objects for nested subparts, while parts_multipart splits every boundary and previously enforced neither total-part nor nesting limits. Exposure requires a consuming application to parse attacker-supplied email; crafted messages can exhaust memory or recursion depth and terminate that process.
Summary
What happened
Resource exhaustion in Email::MIME before 1.954 allows remote attackers to crash email-processing services with multipart messages. Email::MIME->new recursively constructs objects for nested subparts, while parts_multipart splits every boundary and previously enforced neither total-part nor nesting limits. Exposure requires a consuming application to parse attacker-supplied email; crafted messages can exhaust memory or recursion depth and terminate that process.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2024-4140
- Published
- May 2, 2024
- Updated
- Feb 13, 2025
- Vendor
- Ricardo Signes
- Product
- Email::MIME
- Classifications
- CWE-770, T1499.003
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- unauthenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- May 2, 2024CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Feb 13, 2025Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
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- Affected versionversion=0 <1.954
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
CVSS describes severity. EPSS estimates exploitation probability.
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
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Weakness, pattern, technique
Public exploit references
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Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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