CVE-2026-14741

NameCVE-2026-14741
DescriptionHTTP::Date versions before 6.08 for Perl allow CPU exhaustion via polynomial regex backtracking in parse_date. parse_date() matches the date string against a chain of alternative regexes, and str2time() delegates to it. Several of these patterns place unbounded quantifiers next to each other before a trailing `\s*$` anchor. A valid date prefix followed by a long interior run of digits, letters, or whitespace and a single trailing byte that defeats the final match forces the engine to repartition the run, giving polynomial (about quadratic) backtracking. A header value of a few tens of kilobytes runs for tens of seconds of CPU. HTTP::Date parses timestamps such as HTTP `Date`, `Expires`, and `Last-Modified` headers, which commonly originate from untrusted sources. Any caller that passes an untrusted date header to str2time() or parse_date() can be driven to consume unbounded CPU, a denial of service.
SourceCVE (at NVD; CERT, ENISA, LWN, oss-sec, fulldisc, Debian ELTS, Red Hat, Ubuntu, Gentoo, SUSE bugzilla/CVE, GitHub advisories/code/issues, web search, more)

Vulnerable and fixed packages

The table below lists information on source packages.

Source PackageReleaseVersionStatus
libhttp-date-perl (PTS)bullseye6.05-1vulnerable
bookworm6.05-2vulnerable
trixie6.06-1vulnerable
forky, sid6.08-1fixed

The information below is based on the following data on fixed versions.

PackageTypeReleaseFixed VersionUrgencyOriginDebian Bugs
libhttp-date-perlsource(unstable)6.08-1

Notes

[trixie] - libhttp-date-perl <no-dsa> (Minor issue)
[bookworm] - libhttp-date-perl <postponed> (Minor issue)
[bullseye] - libhttp-date-perl <postponed> (Minor issue)
https://lists.security.metacpan.org/cve-announce/msg/41907585/
https://github.com/libwww-perl/HTTP-Date/commit/78c20952cdfbf11e03cf1199ad70f13298a84c5c (v6.08)

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