RubyApplication · Ruby Lang
CVE-2008-4310
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 · uneditedhttputils.rb in WEBrick in Ruby 1.8.1 and 1.8.5, as used in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 and 5, allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (CPU consumption) via a crafted HTTP request. NOTE: this issue exists because of an incomplete fix for CVE-2008-3656.
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 confidenceWEBrick's httputils.rb in Ruby 1.8.1/1.8.5 contains a denial of service vulnerability where crafted HTTP requests cause excessive CPU consumption. This issue is an incomplete fix for the earlier CVE-2008-3656, suggesting the original mitigation did not fully address the underlying parsing vulnerability.
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
RubyApplication
= 1.8.1= 1.8.5CVSS 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
- None
- Integrity
- None
- Availability
- Complete
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Identify installed Ruby versionRun 'ruby --version' or 'ruby -v' on the system to obtain the exact Ruby interpreter versionAffected if The version shown is exactly 1.8.1 or exactly 1.8.5
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Verify WEBrick is in useSearch for 'require webrick' or 'require webrick/httputils' in application code, or check if WEBrick is loaded as a server dependencyAffected if WEBrick is loaded and the Ruby version is 1.8.1 or 1.8.5
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Locate httputils.rb fileFind the httputils.rb file used by the Ruby installation, typically in the lib/ruby/1.8 directory, and note its pathAffected if The file exists and belongs to Ruby 1.8.1 or 1.8.5
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Check for HTTP parsing exposureIf WEBrick is exposed to untrusted HTTP requests (direct listen on network interface), review access logs for patterns of requests with irregular headers or malformed request lines that may trigger excessive CPU parsingAffected if WEBrick is listening on a network-facing port and the Ruby version is 1.8.1 or 1.8.5
The environment is affected if WEBrick is running with Ruby version 1.8.1 or 1.8.5 and handling HTTP requests from the network.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
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.
From vendor dataApply vendor security patches for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4/5 or upgrade to a patched Ruby version. Consider placing a reverse proxy or WAF in front of WEBrick applications as an additional hardening measure.
Fix this in Ruby
Scoped from the published advisory
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation2.0 h
- Testing2.0 h
- Review / QA1.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $1,984.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2008-4310 — 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 sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2008-4310 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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- 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
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