CVE-2026-121437

Mistune 3.3.0 before 3.3.4 Quadratic-Time DoS via _process_emphasis_delimiters

Published Nov 3, 2026 CVSS 4.0 · 8.7 High EPSS < 1% KEV · Not listed
Description
Mistune from 3.3.0 before 3.3.4 contains a denial of service vulnerability that allows remote attackers to exhaust CPU through quadratic-time emphasis delimiter processing. Attackers can submit small markdown documents with repeated patterns like "*a_b" to trigger an O(n²) index-fixup loop, stalling workers for seconds.

Remediation

No solution or workaround provided in the CVE record

Tracking

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Advisories

No advisories available
History
Type Values Removed Values Added
Metrics ssvc

{'options': {'Automatable': 'no', 'Exploitation': 'poc', 'Technical Impact': 'partial'}, 'version': '2.0.3'}

Type Values Removed Values Added
Description Mistune from 3.3.0 before 3.3.4 contains a denial of service vulnerability that allows remote attackers to exhaust CPU through quadratic-time emphasis delimiter processing. Attackers can submit small markdown documents with repeated patterns like "*a_b" to trigger an O(n²) index-fixup loop, stalling workers for seconds.
Title Mistune 3.3.0 before 3.3.4 Quadratic-Time DoS via _process_emphasis_delimiters
First Time appeared Mistune Project
Mistune Project mistune
Weaknesses CWE-407
CPEs cpe:2.3:a:mistune_project:mistune:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
Vendors & Products Mistune Project
Mistune Project mistune
References
Metrics cvssV3_1

{'score': 7.5, 'vector': 'CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H'}

cvssV4_0

{'score': 8.7, 'vector': 'CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N'}

Weaknesses

Sources

Status
PUBLISHED
Assigner
VulnCheck
Published
Updated
Nov 3, 2026, 4:59 PM
Reserved
Nov 3, 2026, 12:32 PM
Status
Deferred
Published
Nov 3, 2026, 3:17 PM
Modified
Nov 3, 2026, 5:18 PM
Severity
Important
Public date
Nov 3, 2026, 2:28 PM