Django Image Field Vulnerable to Image Decompression Bombs

published 2012-07-31 14 y ago modified 2026-06-16 4 mo ago also GHSA-59w8-4wm2-4xw8 , PYSEC-2012-3 , EUVD-2012-0004

cvss: 7.5; version 3.1, GitHub
cisa kev: Not listed; not in CISA's catalog
epss: 2.7%; EPSS 2.7% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 86%
public exploits: 0; none known

The django.forms.ImageField class in the form system in Django before 1.3.2 and 1.4.x before 1.4.1 completely decompresses image data during image validation, which allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (memory consumption) by uploading an image file.

Patch / fix

fixed in 1 distros 1 links 3

pypi django 1.3.2, 1.4.1

python-django Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 1.4.1-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2012-3443

github.com/django/django@9ca0ff6 commit
github.com/django/django@da33d67 commit
djangoproject.com/weblog/2012/jul/30/security-releases-issued/ advisory

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-2012-3443 updated 2025-11-21 cvss 4.3

Django: 1.3.1 and 1.4.0 Denial-of-service in image validation

Red Hat All currently supported Red Hat products
not affected: vulnerable code not present

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

2.71% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 86% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by	version	score	vector
NVD	2.0	5.0	AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P
GitHub	3.1	7.5	CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Affected packages

ecosystem	package	affected	fixed in
pypi	django	<1.3.2 >=1.4, <1.4.1	1.3.2 1.4.1

Classification

Weakness

CWE-20 Improper Input Validation
CWE-400 Uncontrolled Resource Consumption

Technology feeds

Django rss critical rss

References

djangoproject.com /weblog/2012/jul/30/security-releases-issued/
patch, vendor-advisory, article
github.com /django/django/commit/9ca0ff6268eeff92d0d0ac2c315d4b6a8e229155
web
github.com /django/django/commit/da33d67181b53fe6cc737ac1220153814a1509f6
web
mandriva.com /security/advisories?name=MDVSA-2012:143
vendor-advisory, web, advisory
ubuntu.com /usn/USN-1560-1
vendor-advisory, web, advisory
debian.org /security/2012/dsa-2529
vendor-advisory, web, advisory
openwall.com /lists/oss-security/2012/07/31/1
mailing-list, web
openwall.com /lists/oss-security/2012/07/31/2
mailing-list, web
nvd.nist.gov /vuln/detail/CVE-2012-3443
advisory
github.com /django/django
package
github.com /pypa/advisory-database/tree/main/vulns/django/PYSEC-2012-3.yaml
web
debian.org /security/2012/dsa-2529
web
djangoproject.com /weblog/2012/jul/30/security-releases-issued
web
mandriva.com /security/advisories?name=MDVSA-2012:143
web
openwall.com /lists/oss-security/2012/07/31/1
web
openwall.com /lists/oss-security/2012/07/31/2
web
ubuntu.com /usn/USN-1560-1
web
github.com /advisories/GHSA-59w8-4wm2-4xw8
advisory

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.

Summary