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Fencer Vulns
high 8.8

CVE-2016-5851 json

Improper Restriction of XML External Entity Reference in python-docx

published 2016-12-21 9 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also GHSA-34wj-p5jm-2p96 , PYSEC-2016-21 , EUVD-2016-0027

cvss
8.8
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
2.4%
EPSS 2.4% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 83%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

python-docx before 0.8.6 allows context-dependent attackers to conduct XML External Entity (XXE) attacks via a crafted document.

Patch / fix

  • pypi python-docx 0.8.6

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-2016-5851 updated cvss 5.9

python-docx: XML External Entity Attack

  • Red Hat All currently supported Red Hat products
    not 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

Exploit prediction

2.35% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 83% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.1 8.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
NVD 2.0 6.8 AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P
GitHub 3.1 8.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Affected packages

ecosystem package affected fixed in
pypi python-docx
<0.8.6
0.8.6

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-611 Improper Restriction of XML External Entity Reference

References

Sources

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.