CVE-2010-5140
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 · uneditedwxBitcoin and bitcoind before 0.3.13 do not properly handle bitcoins associated with Bitcoin transactions that have zero confirmations, which allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (invalid-transaction flood) by sending low-valued transactions without transaction fees.
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 confidencewxBitcoin and bitcoind before version 0.3.13 fail to properly validate and handle Bitcoin transactions with zero confirmations. Attackers can exploit this by flooding the network with numerous low-valued transactions that lack transaction fees, causing a denial-of-service condition through invalid-transaction flooding.
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<= 0.3.12= 0.3.4= 0.3.5= 0.3.8= 0.3.10= 0.3.11<= 0.3.12= 0.3.4= 0.3.5= 0.3.8= 0.3.10= 0.3.11CVSS 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
- Partial
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P
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 the Bitcoin client implementationDetermine whether you are running bitcoind (the daemon) or wxBitcoin (the GUI version) by checking running processes or installed binariesAffected if The system is running either bitcoind or wxBitcoin
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Retrieve the installed Bitcoin versionRun `bitcoind --version` or check the binary details for wxBitcoin. If bitcoin-cli is available, use `bitcoin-cli getinfo` to query the daemon versionAffected if The version returned is 0.3.12 or lower, or specifically 0.3.4, 0.3.5, 0.3.8, 0.3.10, or 0.3.11
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Confirm zero-confirmation transaction handling is activeCheck the Bitcoin configuration file (bitcoin.conf typically in ~/.bitcoin/) for settings related to transaction acceptance. Examine whether the node is accepting incoming connections and processing unconfirmed transactionsAffected if The node processes zero-confirmation transactions from the network, which is the default behavior for affected versions
You are affected if your Bitcoin Core (bitcoind or wxBitcoin) version is 0.3.12 or lower, specifically including versions 0.3.4, 0.3.5, 0.3.8, 0.3.10, and 0.3.11, and the node is processing zero-confirmation transactions.
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 dataUpgrade affected Bitcoin implementations to version 0.3.13 or later, which contains proper handling for zero-confirmation transactions and implements fee requirements to prevent spam transactions.
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation4.0 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 $2,560.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2010-5140 — 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-2010-5140 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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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.
- 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