Resource exhaustion in PHP

CVE-2015-9253

An issue was discovered in PHP 7.3.x before 7.3.0alpha3, 7.2.x before 7.2.8, and before 7.1.20. The php-fpm master process restarts a child process in an endless loop when using program execution functions (e.g., passthru, exec, shell_exec, or system) with a non-blocking STDIN stream, causing this master process to consume 100% of the CPU, and consume disk space with a large volume of error logs, as demonstrated by an attack by a customer of a shared-hosting facility.

Vulnerability class: DoS (Denial of Service)

Published · last modified .

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 6.5 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.042 (90.6th percentile), scored .

Low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, but still tracked. 91st percentile — 90.6% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS trend (30 days)EPSS over the last 30 days for CVE-2015-9253: held from 0.042 to 0.042.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.042 · newest: 0.042 · change: 0.000

Affected products

  • PHP — versions 7.3.0

Weakness classification (CWE)

Public proof-of-concept exploits

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2015-9253?
CVE-2015-9253 is a medium-severity vulnerability in PHP, classified under Uncontrolled Resource Consumption. CVSS score: 6.5/10. Published 2018-02-19.
How severe is CVE-2015-9253?
Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 6.5 out of 10.
Is CVE-2015-9253 known to be exploited?
1 public proof-of-concept repositories are indexed. Not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.