CVE-2026-19487
Published: August 18, 2026Last modified: August 21, 2026
Description
Perl versions from 5.9.4 before 5.41.9 produce incorrect regular expression match results when a stale failure flag ends the Aho-Corasick prescan early in S_find_byclass. The prescan walks the subject for positions where the full pattern could match, and the engine tries it from the leftmost one recorded. A failing transition sets the failed flag, and a later successful transition does not clear it, so the prescan reads the stale flag as a failure and stops before it can record a candidate that starts earlier. It takes a subject where one candidate is recorded and a later character then forces a fallback through a fail link that succeeds. Example: "ABCDE" =~ m/ABCF|BCDE|C/; # matches C at offset 2, not BCDE "ABCDE" =~ m/ABCF|BCDE|C(G)/; # no match, BCDE missed An alternation like this can miss input it should match, or match it on the wrong branch, so an access or filtering decision made from the result can be wrong.
Severity score breakdown
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| Base score | 5.3 |
| Attack Vector | NETWORK |
| Attack complexity | LOW |
| Privileges required | NONE |
| User interaction | NONE |
| Scope | UNCHANGED |
| Confidentiality | NONE |
| Integrity impact | NONE |
| Availability impact | LOW |
| Vector | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L |
Status
| Product | Release | Package | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alpaquita Linux | 23 LTS | perl | Vulnerable (5.36.0-r0) |
| 25 LTS | perl | Vulnerable (5.40.2-r0) | |
| Stream | perl | Fixed (5.42.0_rc3-r0) | |
| Hardened Containers | 23 LTS | perl | Vulnerable (5.36.0-r0) |
| 25 LTS | perl | Vulnerable (5.40.2-r0) | |
| Stream | perl | Fixed (5.42.0_rc3-r0) |