Resource exhaustion in Reddit Snudown
CVE-2021-41168
Snudown is a reddit-specific fork of the Sundown Markdown parser used by GitHub, with Python integration added. In affected versions snudown was found to be vulnerable to denial of service attacks to its reference table implementation. References written in markdown ` [reference_name]: https://www.example.com` are inserted into a hash table which was found to have a weak hash function, meaning that an attacker can reliably generate a large number of collisions for it. This makes the hash table vulnerable to a hash-collision DoS attack, a type of algorithmic complexity attack. Further the hash table allowed for duplicate entries resulting in long retrieval times. Proofs of concept and further discussion of the hash collision issue are discussed on the snudown GHSA(https://github.com/reddit/snudown/security/advisories/GHSA-6gvv-9q92-w5f6). Users are advised to update to version 1.7.0.
Vulnerability class: Drupalgeddon 2 (CVE-2018-7600)
EPSS: 0.008 (51.8th percentile) — read the EPSS interpretation.
CVSS v3 metric
CVSS v3 base score 6.5 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H.
Affected products
- Reddit Snudown — versions < 1.7.0
Weakness classification (CWE)
References
- security-advisories@github.com (x_refsource_CONFIRM, Exploit, Third Party Advisory)
- security-advisories@github.com (Patch, Third Party Advisory, x_refsource_MISC)
Frequently asked questions
- What is CVE-2021-41168?
- CVE-2021-41168 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Reddit Snudown, classified under Improper Input Validation. CVSS score: 6.5/10. Published 2021-10-21.
- How severe is CVE-2021-41168?
- Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 6.5 out of 10.