NVD / CVE Program· CNA GitHub_M

CVE-2023-28837: Wagtail vulnerable to denial-of-service via memory exhaustion when uploading large files

Noroxi assessment

Priority: Monitor (action score 19/100)

The sources we track (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, Metasploit, Nuclei, GitHub) show no public exploit code or exploitation in the wild.
Probability of exploitation in the next 30 days: 1% (FIRST EPSS); higher than 64.7% of all records.
Anyone who can reach it over the internet can trigger it. Administrator privileges are required. No user action is required. No special conditions are required; it is repeatable.
Fixed version: wagtail (PyPI) 4.2.2, 4.1.4.

Low priority for now. Upgrade to wagtail (PyPI) 4.2.2, 4.1.4 or later.

Generated automatically from the record's data: CVSS (NVD and CNA), CISA KEV and SSVC, FIRST EPSS, exploit sources, fixed versions. How we calculate it

Primary sources: NVD · CVE.org · FIRST EPSS

Wagtail is an open source content management system built on Django. Prior to versions 4.1.4 and 4.2.2, a memory exhaustion bug exists in Wagtail's handling of uploaded images and documents. For both images and documents, files are loaded into memory during upload for additional processing. A user with access to upload images or documents through the Wagtail admin interface could upload a file so large that it results in a crash of denial of service. The vulnerability is not exploitable by an ordinary site visitor without access to the Wagtail admin. It can only be exploited by admin users with permission to upload images or documents. Image uploads are restricted to 10MB by default, however this validation only happens on the frontend and on the backend after the vulnerable code. Patched versions have been released as Wagtail 4.1.4 and Wagtail 4.2.2). Site owners who are unable to upgrade to the new versions are encouraged to add extra protections outside of Wagtail to limit the size of uploaded files.

MediumCVSS 4.9 · v3.1—No exploit Fix available

Denial of service

Published: Apr 3, 2023
Updated: Jun 17, 2026
EPSS: 1.0% · 64th percentile
CWE: CWE-400

Report tools

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Action score

Monitor

Low priority for now.

CVSS: 19 / 40 · 4.9 / 10
CISA KEV: 0 / 30 · Not listed
EPSS: 0 / 30 · 1.0%

CISA SSVC decision

Exploitation: none
Automatable: no
Technical impact: partial

Vulnrichment: CISA's decision-tree inputs.

CNA vs NVD score

NVD: 4.9
CNA · GitHub_M: 4.9; agree

The score given by the assigning authority versus NVD’s independent score. A gap means the severity is contested.

Get told when this record changes

Not in KEV: no record of exploitation in the wild
No public exploit code on record
A fix has been released

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Noroxi analysis

What does it mean in your environment?

The assessment above is generated automatically from the record's data; it doesn't know your environment. Our team verifies on your systems whether this vulnerability is actually exploitable and which mitigation is enough.

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Affected systems

Is your version affected?

Pick the product and type the version you run. It's compared with this record's version ranges in your browser; the version isn't sent anywhere.

Vendor	Product	CPE
torchbox	wagtail	cpe:2.3:a:torchbox:wagtail

Affected versions

NVD version ranges (for catalog products). Add the product to your stack with a version and matching uses these.

torchbox wagtailbefore 4.1.4
torchbox wagtail4.2 and later · before 4.2.2

Versions reported by the vendor

Affected version ranges reported by the assigning authority (GitHub_M). Independent of NVD's CPE analysis and usually ahead of it.

wagtail wagtail
- < 4.1.4, >= 4.2, < 4.2.2affected

Package-level exposure

OSV and GitHub Advisory data: ecosystem, package and range. SBOM matching uses this table.

Ecosystem	Package	Affected range	Fix
PyPI	wagtail	from 4.2 · before 4.2.2	4.2.2
PyPI	wagtail	before 4.1.4	4.1.4

Same product

torchbox: all records

Other highest-scoring records for the same primary product.

CVE-2026-54263Wagtail: Reflected XSS in dynamic image URL generator view
29Monitor
CVE-2020-11001Possible XSS attack in Wagtail
27Monitor
CVE-2026-54261Wagtail: Improper permission handling in image preview
26Monitor

Published before and after this one in the same product

← EarlierCVE-2022-21683Jan 18, 2022 · Comment reply notifications sent to incorrect users in wagtail
17Monitor
← EarlierCVE-2023-28836Apr 3, 2023 · Wagtail vulnerable to stored Cross-site Scripting attack via ModelAdmin views
21Monitor
Later →CVE-2023-45809Oct 19, 2023 · Disclosure of user names via admin bulk action views in wagtail
10Monitor

Remediation

Which version to upgrade to

Fix versions compiled from the vendor, package registries and Microsoft. Verify the vendor's note before upgrading.

Product / package	Fixed version	Source
PyPI:wagtail	4.1.4	Package registry (OSV)
PyPI:wagtail	4.2.2	Package registry (OSV)

Exploit status

No known public exploit

No public exploit has been observed yet. That doesn't mean you're safe, only that the bar is a little higher.

Research context

For pentesters and researchers: attack profile, score disagreement, timeline, patch commits, credits, variant and chain candidates, bug bounty scope. All derived from existing data; no exploit code.

Timeline

From publication to today: proof of concept, Metasploit module, CISA KEV and fix record. Dates are as reported by the sources.

No dated events beyond publication.

EPSS, last 120 days

FIRST EPSS daily score; only changes of 0.01 or more are recorded (step chart).

Patch and commit links

Commit, PR and diff links among the references. A starting point for patch-diffing and variant hunting; fixes, not exploits.

Credits

All researchers

Finders, reporters and analysts named in the CNA record. Click a name for that researcher’s other records.

No credits in the CNA record.

Variant candidates

Same product, same weakness class, within 18 months. If the patch missed the root cause, the sibling bug is here.

No nightly-computed relations.

Chain candidates

An authentication bypass and a privilege-requiring bug in the same product, published close together: combined they may become an unauthenticated path.

—

Bug bounty scope

No known public program.

Source: bounty-targets-data (public HackerOne, Bugcrowd, Intigriti, YesWeHack listings).

Technical details

Attack conditions

Anyone who can reach it over the internet can trigger it.
Administrator privileges are required.
No user action is required.
No special conditions are required; it is repeatable.

If successful

Confidentiality: none
Integrity: none
Availability: high · the service can be disrupted

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

Weakness class (CWE)

CWE-400 · Uncontrolled Resource Consumption

CVSS vector

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

nvd-primary

Root cause

Code that parses nested structures sets no depth or size limit. A small input can turn into a disproportionate processing load.

The bug in code

The whole CWE-400 class

A representative example of this vulnerability class. Not the vendor's source code; it shows the faulty pattern and its fix.

Vulnerable

1function expand(node) {
2  return node.children.map(expand);
3}

Fixed

1const MAX_DEPTH = 32;
2function expand(node, depth = 0) {
3  if (depth > MAX_DEPTH) throw new Error("too deep");
4  return node.children.map((c) => expand(c, depth + 1));
5}

Attack context

MITRE CAPEC attack patterns and ATT&CK techniques for this weakness class (CWE). A starting point for detection rules and threat hunting.

Attack patterns (CAPEC)

ATT&CK techniques

Endpoint Denial of ServiceT1499

Change log

Fix✗ → ✓Sep 28, 2026, 10:45 PM UTC

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References

docs.wagtail.org/en/stable/reference/settings.html#wagtailimages-max-upload-size

Show all references (7 more)

Vendor advisories and official records. Exploit/PoC links are deliberately left out.

All records