What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities

CVE-2022-1941: Out of Memory issue in ProtocolBuffers for cpp and python

• Severity: high (CVSS 7.5 v3.1)
• Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
• EPSS: 1.5% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
• Public exploit or detection template: none known
• Published: 2022-09-22 · updated 2026-06-17
• Weakness: CWE-1286

Description

A parsing vulnerability for the MessageSet type in the ProtocolBuffers versions prior to and including 3.16.1, 3.17.3, 3.18.2, 3.19.4, 3.20.1 and 3.21.5 for protobuf-cpp, and versions prior to and including 3.16.1, 3.17.3, 3.18.2, 3.19.4, 3.20.1 and 4.21.5 for protobuf-python can lead to out of memory failures. A specially crafted message with multiple key-value per elements creates parsing issues, and can lead to a Denial of Service against services receiving unsanitized input. We recommend upgrading to versions 3.18.3, 3.19.5, 3.20.2, 3.21.6 for protobuf-cpp and 3.18.3, 3.19.5, 3.20.2, 4.21.6 for protobuf-python. Versions for 3.16 and 3.17 are no longer updated.

Affected products

• Debian Linux: 10.0
• Fedoraproject Fedora: 36, 37
• Google LLC protobuf-cpp: before 3.18.3; from 3.19.0 before 3.19.5; from 3.20.0 before 3.20.2; from 3.21.0 before 3.21.6 — fixed in 3.18.3, 3.19.5, 3.20.2, 3.21.6
• protocolbuffers Python-Protobuf: before 3.18.3; from 3.19.0 before 3.19.5; from 3.20.0 before 3.20.2; from 4.0.0 before 4.21.6 — fixed in 3.18.3, 3.19.5, 3.20.2, 4.21.6

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: Google LLC protobuf-cpp 3.18.3, 3.19.5, 3.20.2, 3.21.6; protocolbuffers Python-Protobuf 3.18.3, 3.19.5, 3.20.2, 4.21.6. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

• http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2022/09/27/1
• https://cloud.google.com/support/bulletins#GCP-2022-019
• https://github.com/protocolbuffers/protobuf/security/advisories/GHSA-8gq9-2x98-w8hf
• https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2023/04/msg00019.html
• https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/CBAUKJQL6O4TIWYBENORSY5P43TVB4M3/
• https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/MPCGUT3T5L6C3IDWUPSUO22QDCGQKTOP/
• https://security.netapp.com/advisory/ntap-20240705-0001/
• http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2022/09/27/1
• https://cloud.google.com/support/bulletins#GCP-2022-019
• https://github.com/protocolbuffers/protobuf/security/advisories/GHSA-8gq9-2x98-w8hf
• https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2023/04/msg00019.html
• https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/CBAUKJQL6O4TIWYBENORSY5P43TVB4M3/

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