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Fencer Intel
critical 9.8

CVE-2019-11500 in the critical feed json

In Dovecot before 2.2.36.4 and 2.3.x before 2.3.7.2 (and Pigeonhole before 0.5.7.2), protocol processing can fail for quoted strings.

published 7y ago modified 4mo ago also EUVD-2019-3173

cvss
9.8
version 3.0, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
62.3%
EPSS 62.3% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 99.1%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

In Dovecot before 2.2.36.4 and 2.3.x before 2.3.7.2 (and Pigeonhole before 0.5.7.2), protocol processing can fail for quoted strings. This occurs because '\0' characters are mishandled, and can lead to out-of-bounds writes and remote code execution.

Patch / fix

  • dovecot dovecot 2.2.36.4, 2.3.7.2
  • dovecot pigeonhole 0.5.7.2
  • dovecot Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 1:2.3.7.2-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2019-11500

  • dovecot Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 1:2.2.22-1ubuntu2.11
  • dovecot Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 1:2.2.33.2-1ubuntu4.4
  • dovecot Ubuntu Pro 14.04 LTS 1:2.2.9-1ubuntu2.6+esm1

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2019-11500

Ubuntu security data © Canonical Ltd., from https://github.com/canonical/ubuntu-security-notices via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • dovecot RHEL 6 1:2.0.9-22.el6_10.1
  • dovecot-mysql RHEL 6 1:2.0.9-22.el6_10.1
  • dovecot-pgsql RHEL 6 1:2.0.9-22.el6_10.1
  • dovecot-pigeonhole RHEL 6 1:2.0.9-22.el6_10.1
  • dovecot RHEL 7 1:2.2.36-3.el7_7.1
  • dovecot-mysql RHEL 7 1:2.2.36-3.el7_7.1
  • dovecot-pgsql RHEL 7 1:2.2.36-3.el7_7.1
  • dovecot-pigeonhole RHEL 7 1:2.2.36-3.el7_7.1

red hat advisories RHSA-2019:2885RHSA-2019:2836RHSA-2019:2822

  • dovecot23 SLE Module for Server Applications 15 SP1 2.3.3-8.1
  • dovecot22 SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES for SAP 12 SP4, SLES for SAP 12 SP3 +17 more 2.2.31-19.17.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2019:2514-1SUSE-SU-2019:2454-1

  • dovecot24 openSUSE Tumbleweed 2.4.0-1.1
  • dovecot23 openSUSE Tumbleweed 2.3.16-1.6
  • dovecot23 openSUSE Leap 15.1 2.3.3-lp151.2.6.1
  • dovecot23 openSUSE Leap 15.0 2.3.3-lp150.14.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2025:14715-1openSUSE-SU-2024:10726-1openSUSE-SU-2019:2281-1openSUSE-SU-2019:2278-1

  • dovecot Alpine 3.24, Alpine 3.23, Alpine 3.22 +14 more 2.3.7.2-r0
  • dovecot Alpine 3.7 2.2.36.4-r0

alpine advisories ALPINE-CVE-2019-11500

Alpine secdb © Alpine Linux, from https://secdb.alpinelinux.org via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • dovecot Arch Linux 2.3.7.2-1
  • pigeonhole Arch Linux 0.5.7.2-1

arch linux advisories AVG-1026AVG-1027

Is CVE-2019-11500 in your stack? Fencer shows which of your repositories are affected as soon as an advisory lands, and opens the fix as a pull request.

Check with Fencer

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-2019-11500 updated cvss 8.1

dovecot: improper NULL byte handling in IMAP and ManageSieve protocol parsers leads to out of bounds writes

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 dovecot
    affected: no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • Red Hat CodeReady Linux Builder (v. 8) dovecot 2.2.36-5.el8_0.1 Red Hat Enterprise Linux AppStream (v. 8) dovecot 2.2.36-5.el8_0.1, dovecot-mysql 2.2.36-5.el8_0.1, dovecot-pgsql 2.2.36-5.el8_0.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2822
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server (v. 6) dovecot 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1, dovecot-mysql 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1, dovecot-pgsql 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1, dovecot-pigeonhole 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2885
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server (v. 7) dovecot 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1, dovecot-mysql 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1, dovecot-pgsql 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1, dovecot-pigeonhole 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2836
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server Optional (v. 6) dovecot-devel 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1, dovecot-debuginfo 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2885
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server Optional (v. 7) dovecot-devel 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1, dovecot-debuginfo 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2836
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation (v. 6) dovecot 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1, dovecot-mysql 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1, dovecot-pgsql 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1, dovecot-pigeonhole 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2885
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation (v. 7) dovecot 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1, dovecot-mysql 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1, dovecot-pgsql 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1, dovecot-pigeonhole 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2836
show 2 more
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation Optional (v. 6) dovecot-devel 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1, dovecot-debuginfo 2.0.9-22.el6_10.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2885
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation Optional (v. 7) dovecot-devel 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1, dovecot-debuginfo 2.2.36-3.el7_7.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2836

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

62.32% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 99.1% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

Exploits and checks

  • openwall.com http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2019/08/28/3 referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.0 9.8 CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
NVD 2.0 7.5 AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P

Classification

Weakness

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.