What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities

CVE-2026-85644: XS::Parse::Infix versions from 0.40 through 0.49 for Perl treat a number as an array reference

• Severity: high (CVSS 7.5 v3.1)
• Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
• EPSS: 0.4% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
• Public exploit or detection template: none known
• Published: 2026-09-28 · updated 2026-09-30
• Weakness: CWE-843

Description

XS::Parse::Infix versions from 0.40 through 0.49 for Perl treat a number as an array reference. The wrapper function XS::Parse::Infix generates for a list-associative infix operator checks whether arguments are array references, but it tests using SvRV() rather than SvROK(). SvRV() reads a union slot that only holds a referent once SvROK(sv) is true, so the guard never validates that it is a reference. For an IV or NV that slot holds the number itself, SvRV() returns the caller's value and SvTYPE() dereferences it at offset 12. This will generally result in a segmentation fault. An application that hands the wrapper a list built from decoded input (for example, from JSON) lets whoever supplies a number in that list choose the address that the interpreter dereferences. An ordinary string's byte 12 is rarely SVt_PVAV so the guard croaks by luck, but an attacker-crafted string carrying 0x0b there passes, and the buffer is then used as an AV head, with AvARRAY taken from bytes 16-23 and its entries pushed onto the Perl stack as live SVs. A simple proof-of-concept uses the zip operator: use Syntax::Operator::Zip 'zip'; my @args = ([1], 2); zip(@args);

Affected products

• XS-Parse-Keyword: from 0.40 through 0.49

References

• https://metacpan.org/release/PEVANS/XS-Parse-Keyword-0.50/changes
• https://metacpan.org/release/PEVANS/XS-Parse-Keyword-0.50/diff/PEVANS/XS-Parse-Keyword-0.49#src/infix.c
• http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2026/09/28/14

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