Vulnerability in Archive\ \
CVE-2026-9538
Archive::Tar versions before 3.10 for Perl allow memory exhaustion via attacker controlled entry size field in tar header. _read_tar() reads each entry's payload with $handle->read($$data, $block), where $block is derived from the entry's 12-byte size field in the tar header with no upper bound on that value. A crafted header declaring a multi-gigabyte size causes Perl to allocate a scalar of that size.
Published · last modified .
CVSS v3 metric
CVSS v3 base score 7.5 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H.
EPSS exploit prediction
EPSS: 0.006 (44.4th percentile), scored .
Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 44th percentile — 44.4% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.
EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.004 · newest: 0.006 · change: +0.001
Affected products
- Archive\ \ — versions tar_project
- Archive\:\:tar Project
- Bingos Archive::tar — versions 0
Weakness classification (CWE)
References
- 9b29abf9-4ab0-4765-b253-1875cd9b441e (Patch, patch)
- 9b29abf9-4ab0-4765-b253-1875cd9b441e (release-notes, Release Notes)
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108 (Mailing List, Third Party Advisory)
Frequently asked questions
- What is CVE-2026-9538?
- CVE-2026-9538 is a high-severity vulnerability in Archive\ \, classified under CWE-789. CVSS score: 7.5/10. Published 2026-05-26.
- How severe is CVE-2026-9538?
- High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.5 out of 10.