What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities
CVE-2023-2828: named's configured cache size limit can be significantly exceeded
- Severity: high (CVSS 7.5 v3.1)
- Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
- EPSS: 3.7% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
- Public exploit or detection template: none known
- Published: 2023-06-21 · updated 2026-10-24
- Weakness: CWE-770
Description
Every `named` instance configured to run as a recursive resolver maintains a cache database holding the responses to the queries it has recently sent to authoritative servers. The size limit for that cache database can be configured using the `max-cache-size` statement in the configuration file; it defaults to 90% of the total amount of memory available on the host. When the size of the cache reaches 7/8 of the configured limit, a cache-cleaning algorithm starts to remove expired and/or least-recently used RRsets from the cache, to keep memory use below the configured limit. It has been discovered that the effectiveness of the cache-cleaning algorithm used in `named` can be severely diminished by querying the resolver for specific RRsets in a certain order, effectively allowing the configured `max-cache-size` limit to be significantly exceeded. This issue affects BIND 9 versions 9.11.0 through 9.16.41, 9.18.0 through 9.18.15, 9.19.0 through 9.19.13, 9.11.3-S1 through 9.16.41-S1, and 9.18.11-S1 through 9.18.15-S1.
Affected products
- Debian Linux: 10.0, 11.0, 12.0
- Fedoraproject Fedora: 37, 38
- ISC BIND: from 9.11.0 through 9.16.41; from 9.11.3 through 9.16.41; from 9.18.0 through 9.18.15; from 9.18.11 through 9.18.15; from 9.19.0 through 9.19.13
- Active IQ Unified Manager for VMware vSphere, Linux, and Microsoft Windows: all versions
- NetApp H300S Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H410C Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H410S Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H500S Firmware: all versions
- NetApp H700S Firmware: all versions
References
- http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2023/06/21/6
- https://kb.isc.org/docs/cve-2023-2828
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2023/07/msg00021.html
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce@lists.fedoraproject.org/message/SEFCEVCTYEMKTWA7V7EYPI5YQQ4JWDLI/
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce@lists.fedoraproject.org/message/U3K6AJK7RRSR53HRF5GGKPA6PDUDWOD2/
- https://security.netapp.com/advisory/ntap-20230703-0010/
- https://www.debian.org/security/2023/dsa-5439
- http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2023/06/21/6
- https://kb.isc.org/docs/cve-2023-2828
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2023/07/msg00021.html
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce@lists.fedoraproject.org/message/SEFCEVCTYEMKTWA7V7EYPI5YQQ4JWDLI/
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce@lists.fedoraproject.org/message/U3K6AJK7RRSR53HRF5GGKPA6PDUDWOD2/
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