Vulnerability · Published Jul 8, 2026 · Assigned by CPANSec
CVE-2026-49146App::Ack versions before 3.10.0 for Perl allow memory exhaustion via an unbounded context value in a project .ackrc
High 7.5
In plain English
A high-severity resource allocation without limits in App::Ack from PETDANCE. There are no confirmed reports of exploitation so far. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 0.6% (higher than 49% of all known vulnerabilities). Fixed versions are available - upgrade the affected package.
Official description
App::Ack versions before 3.10.0 for Perl allow memory exhaustion via an unbounded context value in a project .ackrc. ack searches up the directory hierarchy from the current directory for a project .ackrc and loads its options. The -B and -C context options accepted any positive integer, and ack sized the before-context buffer to that value, so a project .ackrc setting --before-context=100000000 made ack allocate a buffer of 100 million elements. A project .ackrc committed to an untrusted repository can abort ack with an out-of-memory condition.
Affected packages & fixed versions
| Ecosystem | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alpine:v3.24 | ack | 3.10.0-r0 | ALPINE-CVE-2026-49146 |
| Debian:12 | ack | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-49146 |
| Debian:13 | ack | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-49146 |
| Debian:14 | ack | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-49146 |
| Ubuntu:22.04:LTS | ack | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-49146 |
| Ubuntu:24.04:LTS | ack | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-49146 |
| Ubuntu:25.10 | ack | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-49146 |
| Ubuntu:26.04:LTS | ack | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-49146 |
| Ubuntu:26.10 | ack | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-49146 |
Affected products (as reported)
Weakness: CWE-770 · Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H