PineApplication · University Of Washington

CVE-2000-0352

HIGH · 10.0 CVSS v2.0 Published 1999-11-18
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
100/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
Remotely reachable No privileges Zero-click

Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.

NVD · unedited
Pine before version 4.21 does not properly filter shell metacharacters from URLs, which allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary commands via a malformed URL.

Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.

dbcve analysis · high confidence

Pine email client versions prior to 4.21 fail to properly filter shell metacharacters embedded in URLs. When a user clicks or processes a maliciously crafted URL, the unfiltered metacharacters can be interpreted by the shell, allowing arbitrary command execution on the affected system.

MitigationUpgrade Pine to version 4.21 or later to obtain the patched version that properly sanitizes URL input. Users should avoid clicking untrusted or suspicious URLs until the upgrade is applied.

Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.

Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.

NVD · CPE data
PineApplication
Affected:= 4.20= 4.21

CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.

From the vector
Attack vector
Network
Complexity
Low
Authentication
None
Confidentiality
Complete
Integrity
Complete
Availability
Complete

AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C

Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.

dbcve checks

Work through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.

  1. Verify Pine is installed
    Locate the Pine binary on the system using 'which pine' or by searching common binary directories
    Affected if Pine executable is found on the system
  2. Determine installed Pine version
    Run 'pine -version' or 'pine --version' to display the version number
    Affected if The displayed version is 4.20 or earlier
  3. Confirm version matches affected range
    Compare the installed version number to the affected range (versions prior to 4.21)
    Affected if The version is 4.20 or any version lower than 4.21
  4. Identify URL handling usage
    Check if Pine is configured for email processing where users may click or open embedded URLs
    Affected if Pine is used to read email containing clickable URLs, as the flaw requires user interaction with a malicious URL

A system is affected if Pine version 4.20 or earlier is installed and users process emails with embedded URLs that could contain shell metacharacters.

Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.

Check your environment

Paste your version and any relevant configuration and it will be compared against the affected criteria above. Do not include secrets or credentials.

AI-assisted, checked against the advisory. Informational, not a guarantee.

Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.

dbcve · scoped
Mitigation available No clean upgrade yet — mitigate in the meantime
Mitigation

Upgrade Pine to version 4.21 or later to obtain the patched version that properly sanitizes URL input. Users should avoid clicking untrusted or suspicious URLs until the upgrade is applied.

Recommended fix Moderate confidence

Pine 4.21 or later (note: Pine has been discontinued since 2005; consider migrating to Alpine or another actively maintained email client)

  1. 1. Check the current Pine version by running 'pine -v' or 'pine -version'
  2. 2. Verify the operating system and package management system in use (e.g., RPM for Linux, or source compilation)
  3. 3. Obtain Pine version 4.21 or later from a trusted source such as the distribution's official repositories or archived software repositories
  4. 4. Back up any important Pine configuration files (typically located in ~/.pinerc or /etc/pine.conf)
  5. 5. Install the updated Pine package using the appropriate package manager (e.g., 'rpm -Uvh pine-4.21.rpm' for RPM-based systems)
  6. 6. Verify the new version is installed by running 'pine -v' again
  7. 7. Review the configuration files to ensure no malicious modifications were made during the vulnerable period
Caveat Pine has been unmaintained since approximately 2005. Upgrading to the fixed version may not be possible on modern systems without compilation from source, and no further security updates will be released. Consider migrating to Alpine (the actively maintained fork) or a modern email client.

Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.

Fix this in Pine Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation6.0 h
  • Implementation12.0 h
  • Testing6.0 h
  • Review / QA4.0 h
28.0 hours of engineering $4,980
Get help mitigating

An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $7,968.

Scan for this in your stack

Free · runs locally
dbcve dependency scanner

Check whether your project pulls in CVE-2000-0352 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.

References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.

Primary sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2000-0352 in production — separate from our analysis above.

No notes yet

Be the first to add a field note for this CVE — a mitigation you’ve verified, a version caveat, or a link to a working fix. Sign in above to contribute.

What this is

A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.

What belongs here
  • Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
  • No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
  • No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data