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Pivotal RabbitMQ is vulnerable to a denial of service attack

High severity GitHub Reviewed Published May 24, 2022 to the GitHub Advisory Database • Updated Apr 2, 2025

Package

erlang RabbitMQ (Erlang)

Affected versions

>= 3.7.0, < 3.7.21
>= 3.8.0, < 3.8.1
< 1.16.7
>= 1.17.0, < 1.17.4

Patched versions

3.7.21
3.8.1
1.16.7
1.17.4

Description

Pivotal RabbitMQ, versions 3.7.x prior to 3.7.21 and 3.8.x prior to 3.8.1, and RabbitMQ for Pivotal Platform, 1.16.x versions prior to 1.16.7 and 1.17.x versions prior to 1.17.4, contain a web management plugin that is vulnerable to a denial of service attack. The "X-Reason" HTTP Header can be leveraged to insert a malicious Erlang format string that will expand and consume the heap, resulting in the server crashing.

References

Published by the National Vulnerability Database Nov 23, 2019
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database May 24, 2022
Reviewed Jul 1, 2022
Last updated Apr 2, 2025

Severity

High

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

EPSS score

Exploit Prediction Scoring System (EPSS)

This score estimates the probability of this vulnerability being exploited within the next 30 days. Data provided by FIRST.
(69th percentile)

Weaknesses

Use of Externally-Controlled Format String

The product uses a function that accepts a format string as an argument, but the format string originates from an external source. Learn more on MITRE.

Uncontrolled Resource Consumption

The product does not properly control the allocation and maintenance of a limited resource, thereby enabling an actor to influence the amount of resources consumed, eventually leading to the exhaustion of available resources. Learn more on MITRE.

CVE ID

CVE-2019-11287

GHSA ID

GHSA-hrfh-7j5f-8ccr

Source code

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