What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities

CVE-2009-20007: Talkative IRC v0.4.4.16 Response Buffer Overflow

• Severity: critical (CVSS 9.3 v4.0)
• Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
• EPSS: 1.7% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
• Public exploit or detection template: none known
• Published: 2025-09-16 · updated 2026-10-01
• Weakness: CWE-121

Description

Talkative IRC v0.4.4.16 is vulnerable to a stack-based buffer overflow when processing specially crafted response strings sent to a connected client. An attacker can exploit this flaw by sending an overly long message that overflows a fixed-length buffer, potentially leading to arbitrary code execution in the context of the vulnerable process. This vulnerability is exploitable remotely and does not require authentication.

Affected products

• Talkative IRC: through 0.4.4.16

References

• https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/master/modules/exploits/windows/misc/talkative_response.rb
• https://web.archive.org/web/20090116203306/http://www.talkative-irc.com/
• https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/16459
• https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/8227
• https://www.vulncheck.com/advisories/talkative-irc-response-buffer-overflow
• https://www.zeroscience.mk/en/vulnerabilities/ZSL-2009-4909.php
• https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/master/modules/exploits/windows/misc/talkative_response.rb
• https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/16459
• https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/8227
• https://www.zeroscience.mk/en/vulnerabilities/ZSL-2009-4909.php

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