# CVE-2019-9705: Denial of service in n/a

> Local attackers can cause denial of service via memory consumption by submitting large crontab files to Vixie Cron.

- **Severity:** Medium 5.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 12 Mar 2019
- **Updated:** 4 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2019-9705, GHSA-3rh6-vqr9-vpx5, UBUNTU-CVE-2019-9705

## What is CVE-2019-9705?

CVE-2019-9705 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Debian Debian Linux, published on 12 Mar 2019. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

Vixie Cron before the 3.0pl1-133 Debian package allows local users to cause a denial of service (memory consumption) via a large crontab file because an unlimited number of lines is accepted.

Weakness: CWE-770 (Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2019-9705?

It affects 3 products.


Products: Cron Project Cron, Debian Debian Linux, Fedoraproject Fedora.

## How do I fix CVE-2019-9705?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2019-9705 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2019-9705 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Debian Debian Linux

- [CVE-2017-9525](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-9525/): Privilege escalation in n/a (medium 6.7)
- [CVE-2019-9704](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2019-9704/): Null dereference in n/a (medium 5.5)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2019-9705 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2019-9705 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Debian Debian Linux, published on 12 Mar 2019. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2019-9705 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-2019-9705/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2019-9705/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2019-9705
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-9705
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2019-9705

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2019-9705/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.