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Fencer Intel
medium 5.0

CVE-2012-2318 json

msg.c in the MSN protocol plugin in libpurple in Pidgin before 2.10.4 does not properly handle crafted characters, which allows remote serv…

published 2012-07-03 14 y ago modified 2026-06-16 4 mo ago also EUVD-2012-2311

cvss
5.0
version 2.0, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
1.7%
EPSS 1.7% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 77%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

msg.c in the MSN protocol plugin in libpurple in Pidgin before 2.10.4 does not properly handle crafted characters, which allows remote servers to cause a denial of service (application crash) by placing these characters in a text/plain message.

Patch / fix

  • pidgin Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 2.10.4-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2012-2318

  • pidgin RHEL 5 PRODUCTIVITY, RHEL 5 2.6.6-11.el5.4
  • pidgin RHEL 6 2.7.9-5.el6.2
  • finch RHEL 5 PRODUCTIVITY, RHEL 5 2.6.6-11.el5.4
  • finch RHEL 6 2.7.9-5.el6.2
  • libpurple RHEL 5 PRODUCTIVITY, RHEL 5 2.6.6-11.el5.4
  • libpurple RHEL 6 2.7.9-5.el6.2
  • pidgin-perl RHEL 5 PRODUCTIVITY, RHEL 5 2.6.6-11.el5.4
  • pidgin-perl RHEL 6 2.7.9-5.el6.2

red hat advisories RHSA-2012:1102

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2012-2318 updated cvss 4.3

pidgin: Improper validation of incoming plaintext messages in MSN protocol plug-in

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop (v. 5 client) finch 2.6.6-11.el5.4, pidgin 2.6.6-11.el5.4, libpurple 2.6.6-11.el5.4, pidgin-perl 2.6.6-11.el5.4, libpurple-tcl 2.6.6-11.el5.4, libpurple-perl 2.6.6-11.el5.4 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop (v. 6) finch 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-tcl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop Optional (v. 6) finch 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-tcl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server Optional (v. 6) finch 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-tcl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation (v. 6) finch 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-tcl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation Optional (v. 6) finch 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple 2.7.9-5.el6.2, pidgin-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-tcl 2.7.9-5.el6.2, libpurple-perl 2.7.9-5.el6.2
    +2 more products
    Red Hat RHEL Desktop Workstation (v. 5 client) finch 2.6.6-11.el5.4, pidgin 2.6.6-11.el5.4, libpurple 2.6.6-11.el5.4, pidgin-perl 2.6.6-11.el5.4, libpurple-tcl 2.6.6-11.el5.4, libpurple-perl 2.6.6-11.el5.4 Red Hat RHEL Optional Productivity Applications (v. 5 server) finch 2.6.6-11.el5.4, pidgin 2.6.6-11.el5.4, libpurple 2.6.6-11.el5.4, pidgin-perl 2.6.6-11.el5.4, libpurple-tcl 2.6.6-11.el5.4, libpurple-perl 2.6.6-11.el5.4
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2012:1102

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

Exploit prediction

1.69% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 77% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

Exploits and checks

  • hg.pidgin.im http://hg.pidgin.im/pidgin/main/rev/4d6bcb4f4ea4 referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 2.0 5.0 AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-20 Improper Input Validation

References

Sources

Fencer Intel keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.