# CVE-2016-7068: Denial of service in pdns

> Remote attackers can cause denial of service on PowerDNS servers by sending crafted DNS queries that trigger excessive CPU usage.

- **Severity:** Medium 5.3 (`CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 11 Sep 2018
- **Updated:** 6 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2016-7068, DLA-788-1, DSA-3763-1, GHSA-g832-5583-wc79, MGASA-2017-0036, UBUNTU-CVE-2016-7068

## What is CVE-2016-7068?

CVE-2016-7068 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Debian Debian Linux, published on 11 Sep 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 before 3.4.11 and 4.0.2, and PowerDNS recursor before 3.7.4 and 4.0.4, allowing a remote, unauthenticated attacker to cause an abnormal CPU usage load on the PowerDNS server by sending crafted DNS queries, which might result in a partial denial of service if the system becomes overloaded. This issue is based on the fact that the PowerDNS server parses all records present in a query regardless of whether they are needed or even legitimate. A specially crafted query containing a large number of records can be used to take advantage of that behaviour.

Weakness: CWE-400 (Uncontrolled Resource Consumption), CWE-20 (Improper Input Validation)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2016-7068?

It affects 3 products.


Products: Debian Debian Linux, Powerdns Authoritative, Powerdns Recursor.

## How do I fix CVE-2016-7068?

Upgrade to a fixed version.

## Is CVE-2016-7068 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2016-7068 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Debian Debian Linux

- [CVE-2015-3306](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2015-3306/): ProFTPD Improper Access Control (critical 10.0, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2025-49113](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-49113/): RoundCube Webmail Deserialization of Untrusted Data (critical 9.9, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2026-24061](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-24061/): GNU InetUtils Argument Injection (critical 9.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2025-39682](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-39682/): Linux Kernel Improper Check for Unusual or Exceptional Conditions (critical 9.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2024-9680](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-9680/): Mozilla Firefox Use-After-Free (critical 9.8, exploited in the wild)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2016-7068 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2016-7068 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Debian Debian Linux, published on 11 Sep 2018. 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-2016-7068 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Debian Debian Linux. 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-2016-7068/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-7068/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2016-7068
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2016-7068
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2016-7068

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-7068/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.