CPU exhaustion via quadratic incremental markup parsing
Published Jul 9, 2026 · Updated Jul 9, 2026
CPU denial of service in affected CPython releases allows remote attackers to exhaust CPU through incremental HTML parsing. HTMLParser.feed() repeatedly concatenates and rescans its growing raw-data buffer when an unterminated tag, comment, or declaration spans many feed calls, producing quadratic work. Reachability requires an application to incrementally parse attacker-controlled HTML; the bounded consequence is a CPU-driven service hang or severe slowdown, not data access or modification.
Summary
What happened
CPU denial of service in affected CPython releases allows remote attackers to exhaust CPU through incremental HTML parsing. HTMLParser.feed() repeatedly concatenates and rescans its growing raw-data buffer when an unterminated tag, comment, or declaration spans many feed calls, producing quadratic work. Reachability requires an application to incrementally parse attacker-controlled HTML; the bounded consequence is a CPU-driven service hang or severe slowdown, not data access or modification.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-15308
- Published
- Jul 9, 2026
- Updated
- Jul 9, 2026
- Vendor
- Python Software Foundation
- Product
- CPython
- Classifications
- CWE-400, T1499.004
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- unauthenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Jul 9, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Jul 9, 2026Record 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=0 <3.15.0
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
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Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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