CVE-2026-38970 json
pdfcpu through v0.11.1 contains an uncontrolled-recursion denial-of-service issue in pkg/pdfcpu/model/parse.go.
published 2026-07-02 4 mo ago modified 2026-08-21 2 mo ago also EUVD-2026-41474
- cvss
- 7.5
- version 3.1, CNA
- cisa kev
- Not listed
- not in CISA's catalog
- epss
- 0.6%
- EPSS 0.6% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 50%
- public exploits
- 0
- none known
Summary
pdfcpu through v0.11.1 contains an uncontrolled-recursion denial-of-service issue in pkg/pdfcpu/model/parse.go. The parser descends recursively through nested PDF objects, including arrays, via ParseObjectContext() and parseArray() without enforcing a maximum nesting depth.
Patch / fix
Vendor advisories
What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.
red hat product security vex CVE-2026-38970 updated cvss 6.5
github.com/pdfcpu/pdfcpu: pdfcpu: Denial of Service via uncontrolled recursion in PDF parsing
-
Red Hat All currently supported Red Hat productsnot affected: vulnerable code not present
Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf
CISA SSVC
- Exploitation
- none
- Automatable
- yes
- Technical impact
- partial
- Assessed
- 4 mo ago
Exploit prediction
0.63% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 50% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).
CVSS scores
| assigned by | version | score | vector |
|---|---|---|---|
| CISA ADP | 3.1 | 7.5 | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H |
| CNA | 3.1 | 7.5 | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H |
Classification
- Weakness
-
- CWE-674 Uncontrolled Recursion
References
- github.com /pdfcpu/pdfcpu/commit/9db810afb52b555ffcae955b32c0be3a73eb53d3
- github.com /pdfcpu/pdfcpu/blob/a181c19acb322d6b93a1bbda9385a864a9ad6efe/pkg/pdfcpu/model/parse.go#L325-L366
- github.com /pdfcpu/pdfcpu/blob/a181c19acb322d6b93a1bbda9385a864a9ad6efe/pkg/pdfcpu/model/parse.go#L942-L970
- github.com /pdfcpu/pdfcpu
- github.com /pdfcpu/pdfcpu/releases/tag/v0.12.0
Sources
- CVE List CVE-2026-38970
- NVD CVE-2026-38970
Fencer Vulns keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.