CVE-2026-14895

Description

String::Util versions before 1.36 for Perl are susceptible to a regular expression denial of service. The trim and rtrim functions stripped trailing whitespace with s/\s*$//u. Because \s* matches greedily and the $ anchor fails whenever a non-whitespace character follows the whitespace, the regex engine retries the match at each offset of a long whitespace run, producing quadratic backtracking. The fix replaces \s*$ with \s+$. Any caller that passes untrusted input to trim or rtrim can trigger CPU exhaustion with a string containing a long run of whitespace.

Weakness Type (CWE)

CWE-1333 CWE-1333

References

Other References

https://github.com/scottchiefbaker/String-Util/commit/f8150867aaeb8f57c59601aefb2193f2caed8745.patch https://github.com/scottchiefbaker/String-Util/releases https://metacpan.org/release/BAKERSCOT/String-Util-1.36/diff/BAKERSCOT/String-Util-1.35#lib/String/Util.pm http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2026/07/07/18

Frequently Asked Questions

What is CVE-2026-14895? +

String::Util versions before 1.36 for Perl are susceptible to a regular expression denial of service. The trim and rtrim functions stripped trailing whitespace with s/\s*$//u. Because \s* matches greedily and the $ anchor fails whenever a non-whitespace character follows the whitespace, the regex engine retries the match at each offset of a long whitespace run, producing quadratic backtracking. The fix replaces \s*$ with \s+$. Any caller that passes untrusted input to trim or rtrim can trigger CPU exhaustion with a string containing a long run of whitespace.

How do I check if I'm vulnerable to CVE-2026-14895? +

You can use Secably's free Website Scanner to check your website for known vulnerabilities. For infrastructure scanning, use the Port Scanner to identify exposed services that may be affected. Check the vendor advisories linked above for specific patch and version information.

Related Vulnerabilities

CVE-2026-45409

Internationalized Domain Names in Applications (IDNA) for Python provides support for Internationalized Domain Names in Applications (IDNA) and Unicode IDNA …

CVE-2025-48058

PowSyBl (Power System Blocks) is a framework to build power system oriented software. Prior to version 6.7.2, there is a …

CVE-2025-48059

PowSyBl (Power System Blocks) is a framework to build power system oriented software. In com.powsybl:powsybl-iidm-criteria versions 6.3.0 to before 6.7.2 …

CVE-2025-6998

ReDoS in strip_whitespaces() function in cps/string_helper.py in Calibre Web and Autocaliweb allows unauthenticated remote attackers to cause denial of service …

CVE-2025-54363

Microsoft Knack 0.12.0 allows Regular expression Denial of Service (ReDoS) in the knack.introspection module. extract_full_summary_from_signature employs an inefficient regular expression …

CVE-2025-54364

Microsoft Knack 0.12.0 allows Regular expression Denial of Service (ReDoS) in the knack.introspection module. option_descriptions employs an inefficient regular expression …