# CVE-2002-0983: Denial of service in n/a

> Remote attackers can crash the irssi IRC client by sending a specially crafted long channel topic, causing a denial of service.

- **Severity:** Medium 5.0 (`AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 24 Aug 2002
- **Updated:** 8 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** DSA-157, GHSA-xrw3-7gpj-88wx

## What is CVE-2002-0983?

CVE-2002-0983 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in n/a, published on 24 Aug 2002. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

IRC client irssi in irssi-text before 0.8.4 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (crash) via an IRC channel that has a long topic followed by a certain string, possibly triggering a buffer overflow.

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2002-0983?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Irssi Irssi.

## How do I fix CVE-2002-0983?

Upgrade to a fixed version.

## Is CVE-2002-0983 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2002-0983 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in n/a

- [CVE-2002-1840](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2002-1840/): Hardcoded credentials in n/a (critical 10.0)
- [CVE-2017-10965](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-10965/): Null dereference in n/a (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2017-10966](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-10966/): Use after free in n/a (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2017-7191](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-7191/): Use after free in n/a (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2007-4396](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2007-4396/): Command injection in n/a (critical 9.3)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2002-0983 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2002-0983 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in n/a, published on 24 Aug 2002. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2002-0983 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: n/a. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2002-0983/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2002-0983/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2002-0983
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2002-0983
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2002-0983

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2002-0983/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.