CVE-2016-2120 Integer overflow in pdns

What is CVE-2016-2120?

CVE-2016-2120 is a high-severity vulnerability in Debian Debian Linux, published on 1 Nov 2018. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

Official description

An issue has been found in PowerDNS Authoritative Server versions up to and including 3.4.10, 4.0.1 allowing an authorized user to crash the server by inserting a specially crafted record in a zone under their control then sending a DNS query for that record. The issue is due to an integer overflow when checking if the content of the record matches the expected size, allowing an attacker to cause a read past the buffer boundary.

Weakness: CWE-190

Which versions are affected by CVE-2016-2120?

It affects 2 products.

Products include Debian Debian Linux, Powerdns Authoritative.

How do I fix CVE-2016-2120?

Upgrade to a fixed version.

Is CVE-2016-2120 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2016-2120 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Other vulnerabilities in Debian Debian Linux

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• CVE-2025-49113 RoundCube Webmail Deserialization of Untrusted Data Exploited Critical 9.9
• CVE-2026-24061 GNU InetUtils Argument Injection Exploited Critical 9.8
• CVE-2025-39682 Linux Kernel Improper Check for Unusual or Exceptional Conditions Exploited Critical 9.8
• CVE-2024-9680 Mozilla Firefox Use-After-Free Exploited Critical 9.8

All Debian Debian Linux vulnerabilities

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2016-2120, GHSA-mq8j-4764-x4h8, UBUNTU-CVE-2016-2120.