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FedoraOperating system · Fedoraproject

CVE-2015-8383

CRITICAL · 9.8 CVSS v3.1 Published 2015-12-02
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to 5.5.32 / 5.6.18 or later.
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
PCRE before 8.38 mishandles certain repeated conditional groups, which allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (buffer overflow) or possibly have unspecified other impact via a crafted regular expression, as demonstrated by a JavaScript RegExp object encountered by Konqueror.

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 · moderate confidence

PCRE before 8.38 contains a flaw in handling repeated conditional groups within regular expressions. When a specially crafted regex pattern (such as a JavaScript RegExp object) is processed, it can trigger a buffer overflow, leading to denial of service or potentially arbitrary code execution. This affects any application using the vulnerable PCRE library to process untrusted regex input.

MitigationUpgrade PCRE library to version 8.38 or later. If immediate patching is not feasible, implement strict input validation on regex patterns before passing them to the PCRE engine, and consider sandboxing applications that process user-supplied regular expressions.

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
FedoraOperating system
Affected:= 22
PHPApplication
Affected:>= 5.5.0, < 5.5.32>= 5.6.0, < 5.6.18>= 7.0.0, < 7.0.3
Perl Compatible Regular Expression LibraryApplication
Affected:<= 8.37

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
Privileges
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
High

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

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. Identify PCRE library version
    Run `pcre-config --version` or check the PCRE library file version on the system
    Affected if Version is 8.37 or earlier
  2. Identify PHP bundled PCRE version
    Run `php -r 'echo PCRE_VERSION;'` or `php -i | grep PCRE` to get the bundled PCRE version in PHP
    Affected if PCRE version is 8.37 or earlier, or PHP version is 5.5.0-5.5.31, 5.6.0-5.6.17, or 7.0.0-7.0.2
  3. Check Fedora version
    Run `cat /etc/fedora-release` or `cat /etc/redhat-release` to identify the Fedora release
    Affected if System is running Fedora 22
  4. Determine if application processes untrusted regex
    Review application configuration and code to identify if it accepts regex patterns from user input, external APIs, or other untrusted sources
    Affected if Application processes regex patterns from untrusted or user-supplied input

Your environment is affected if the installed PCRE version is 8.37 or earlier (or PHP version falls within the vulnerable ranges) AND your application processes regex patterns from untrusted input sources.

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
Upgrade available Upgrade to 5.5.32 / 5.6.18 / 7.0.3 or later
Fixed in 5.5.325.6.187.0.3
Interim mitigation

Upgrade PCRE library to version 8.38 or later. If immediate patching is not feasible, implement strict input validation on regex patterns before passing them to the PCRE engine, and consider sandboxing applications that process user-supplied regular expressions.

Recommended fix High confidence

PCRE 8.38+ (or PHP 5.5.32+/5.6.18+/7.0.3+ which bundle fixed PCRE)

  1. Identify whether the system uses PHP with bundled PCRE or a system-level PCRE library
  2. For PHP installations: upgrade to PHP 5.5.32+, 5.6.18+, or 7.0.3+ which include the fixed PCRE library
  3. For system PCRE: upgrade to PCRE 8.38 or later
  4. After upgrade, verify the PCRE version matches or exceeds 8.38 using: pcre-config --version or php -i | grep PCRE
  5. Test that applications using regular expressions function correctly after the update
Caveat Minimal risk - this is a bugfix release; however, any complex regex patterns should be tested after upgrade

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

Fix this in Fedora Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation4.0 h
  • Implementation8.0 h
  • Testing4.0 h
  • Review / QA2.0 h
18.0 hours of engineering $3,200
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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-2015-8383 in production — separate from our analysis above.

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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