PAN-OS: URL Category Exceptions Match More URLs Than Intended in URL Filtering

published 2022-02-10 4y ago modified 2026-06-17 4mo ago also EUVD-2022-15232

cvss: 6.5; version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev: Not listed; not in CISA's catalog
epss: 0.7%; EPSS 0.7% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 51%
public exploits: 0; none known

PAN-OS software provides options to exclude specific websites from URL category enforcement and those websites are blocked or allowed (depending on your rules) regardless of their associated URL category. This is done by creating a custom URL category list or by using an external dynamic list (EDL) in a URL Filtering profile. When the entries in these lists have a hostname pattern that does not end with a forward slash (/) or a hostname pattern that ends with an asterisk (*), any URL that starts with the specified pattern is considered a match. Entries with a caret (^) at the end of a hostname pattern match any top level domain. This may inadvertently allow or block more URLs than intended and allowing more URLs than intended represents a security risk. For example: example.com will match example.com.website.test example.com.* will match example.com.website.test example.com.^ will match example.com.test You should take special care when using such entries in policy rules that allow traffic. Where possible, use the exact list of hostname names ending with a forward slash (/) instead of using wildcards. PAN-OS 10.1 versions earlier than PAN-OS 10.1.3; PAN-OS 10.0 versions earlier than PAN-OS 10.0.8; PAN-OS 9.1 versions earlier than PAN-OS 9.1.12; all PAN-OS 9.0 versions; PAN-OS 8.1 versions earlier than PAN-OS 8.1.21, and Prisma Access 2.2 and 2.1 versions do not allow customers to change this behavior without changing the URL category list or EDL.

Patch / fix

fixed in 2

Palo Alto Networks PAN-OS 8.1.21, 9.1.12, 10.0.8, 10.1.3
Palo Alto Networks Prisma Access 3.0 Preferred, Innovation

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Exploit prediction

0.66% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 51% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by	version	score	vector
CNA	3.1	6.5	CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N
NVD	3.1	6.5	CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N
NVD	2.0	4.0	AV:N/AC:L/Au:S/C:N/I:P/A:N

Affected products

Palo Alto Networks PAN-OS
Palo Alto Networks Prisma Access

Classification

Weakness

CWE-436 Interpretation Conflict

Technology feeds

Palo Alto PAN-OS rss critical rss

References

security.paloaltonetworks.com /CVE-2022-0011
mitigation, vendor-advisory

Sources

CVE List CVE-2022-0011
NVD CVE-2022-0011

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