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CVE.org (no NVD analysis yet)· CNA VulnCheck

CVE-2026-126299: NLTK before 3.10.4 Quadratic-Time Denial of Service via CCG Lexicon fromstring

HighCVSS 8.7 · v4.0—No exploit Fix available

Noroxi assessment

Priority: Monitor (action score 34/100)

  • The sources we track (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, Metasploit, Nuclei, GitHub) show no public exploit code or exploitation in the wild.
  • Anyone who can reach it over the internet can trigger it. No account or password is required. No user action is required. No special conditions are required; it is repeatable.
  • Fixed version: nltk nltk 3.10.4.

Low priority for now. Upgrade to nltk nltk 3.10.4 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

NLTK before 3.10.4 contains a denial of service vulnerability in the CCG lexicon parser fromstring that allows remote attackers to exhaust CPU by supplying wide inputs. Attackers can submit lexicon text with long flat bracket bodies or operator chains, triggering quadratic string re-slicing in matchBrackets and augParseCategory that blocks worker threads.

Published
Nov 13, 2026
Updated
Nov 13, 2026
EPSS
—

Report tools

JSON

Action score

34

Monitor

Low priority for now.

CVSS
34 / 40 · 8.7 / 10
CISA KEV
0 / 30 · Not listed
EPSS
0 / 30 · —

CNA vs NVD score

NVD
—
CNA · VulnCheck
8.7
NVD has not scored this yet; the score shown is the CNA’s.

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

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

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  • A fix has been released

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When you'll hear from us

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  • when exploit code appears or is weaponized
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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.

—

Versions reported by the vendor

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

  • nltk nltk

    • 3.10.4not affected
    • before 3.10.4affected · semver

Same product

nltk: all records

Other highest-scoring records for the same primary product.

  • CVE-2026-0848Arbitrary Code Execution in NLTK StanfordSegmenter via Untrusted JAR Loading
    40Plan
  • CVE-2026-79675NLTK before 3.10.3 JVM Argument Injection via Per-Call Options
    37Monitor
  • CVE-2026-79657NLTK before 3.10.3 Remote Code Execution via Unsafe Pickle Deserialization
    37Monitor

Published before and after this one in the same product

  • ← EarlierCVE-2026-126297Nov 13, 2026 · NLTK before 3.10.4 CPU Denial of Service via ConllCorpusReader srl_instances
    34Monitor
  • ← EarlierCVE-2026-126298Nov 13, 2026 · NLTK before 3.10.4 Quadratic CPU Denial of Service via Tree.chomsky_normal_form
    34Monitor
  • Later →CVE-2026-126300Nov 13, 2026 · NLTK from 3.2.5 before 3.10.4 CPU Exhaustion via TreebankWordTokenizer.span_tokenize
    27Monitor

Remediation

Which version to upgrade to

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

Product / packageFixed versionSource
nltk nltk3.10.4Vendor (CNA)

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.

  1. Published
  2. Fix recordedsame day
  3. TodayNov 13, 2026same day

Credits

All researchers

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

Not on record for this CVE: EPSS history · patch commit or PR link · variant or chain candidate · public bounty program.

Technical details

Attack conditions

  • Anyone who can reach it over the internet can trigger it.
  • No account or password is required.
  • No user action is required.
  • No special conditions are required; it is repeatable.

If successful

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

Weakness class (CWE)

CWE-400 · Uncontrolled Resource Consumption

CVSS 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/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X

nvd-secondary

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

ts
function expand(node) {  return node.children.map(expand);}

Fixed

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

Attack context

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

References

Show all references (1 more)

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

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