Denial of service via recursive XML entity expansion
Published Oct 1, 2025 · Updated Oct 1, 2025
XML entity expansion in Splunk Web allows remote authenticated users to interrupt Splunk Enterprise and Splunk Cloud Platform services. The dashboard tab label field accepts XML whose recursively defined DTD entities expand without an effective restriction, exhausting service resources. A low-privilege account without an admin or power role, Splunk Web enabled, and user interaction are required; the bounded result is service interruption.
Summary
What happened
XML entity expansion in Splunk Web allows remote authenticated users to interrupt Splunk Enterprise and Splunk Cloud Platform services. The dashboard tab label field accepts XML whose recursively defined DTD entities expand without an effective restriction, exhausting service resources. A low-privilege account without an admin or power role, Splunk Web enabled, and user interaction are required; the bounded result is service interruption.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2025-20369
- Published
- Oct 1, 2025
- Updated
- Oct 1, 2025
- Vendor
- Splunk, Inc.
- Product
- Splunk Enterprise
- Classifications
- CWE-776, CWE-611, CAPEC-197, T1499
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Oct 1, 2025CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Oct 1, 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?
Compare these published version ranges with your installed build and any vendor patches.
- Affected versionversion=10.0 <10.0.0
- Affected versionversion=9.2 <9.2.8
- Affected versionversion=9.3 <9.3.6
- Affected versionversion=9.4 <9.4.4
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
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Weakness, pattern, technique
Public exploit references
No public exploit references are available in this record.
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Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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