# CVE-2023-28096: OpenSIPS has memory leak in cJSON lib

> Attackers can cause memory exhaustion and denial of service by sending malformed JSON requests to the OpenSIPS management interface if it is exposed without authentication.

- **Severity:** Medium 4.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** An administrator
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** A user has to click or open something
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 15 Mar 2023
- **Updated:** 25 Feb 2025
- **Also known as:** GHSA-2mg2-g46r-j4qr, UBUNTU-CVE-2023-28096

## What is CVE-2023-28096?

CVE-2023-28096 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in opensips, published on 15 Mar 2023. An attacker needs administrator access to exploit it, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.

### Official description

OpenSIPS, a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) server implementation, has a memory leak starting in the 2.3 branch and priot to versions 3.1.8 and 3.2.5. The memory leak was detected in the function `parse_mi_request` while performing coverage-guided fuzzing. This issue can be reproduced by sending multiple requests of the form `{"jsonrpc": "2.0","method": "log_le`. This malformed message was tested against an instance of OpenSIPS via FIFO transport layer and was found to increase the memory consumption over time.

To abuse this memory leak, attackers need to reach the management interface (MI) which typically should only be exposed on trusted interfaces. In cases where the MI is exposed to the internet without authentication, abuse of this issue will lead to memory exhaustion which may affect the underlying system’s availability. No authentication is typically required to reproduce this issue. On the other hand, memory leaks may occur in other areas of OpenSIPS where the cJSON library is used for parsing JSON objects.

The issue has been fixed in versions 3.1.8 and 3.2.5.

Weakness: CWE-401 (Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2023-28096?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Opensips Opensips.

## How do I fix CVE-2023-28096?

No fix has been published for CVE-2023-28096 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2023-28096 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-28096 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in opensips

- [CVE-2023-27596](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-27596/): OpenSIPS has vulnerability in the codec_delete_XX() functions (high 7.5)
- [CVE-2023-27597](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-27597/): OpenSIPS has vulnerability in the parse_uri() function (high 7.5)
- [CVE-2023-27598](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-27598/): OpenSIPS has vulnerability in the parse_via() function (high 7.5)
- [CVE-2023-27599](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-27599/): OpenSIPS has vulnerability in the parse_to_param() function (high 7.5)
- [CVE-2023-27600](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-27600/): OpenSIPS has vulnerability in the codec_delete_XX() functions (high 7.5)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2023-28096 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2023-28096 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in opensips, published on 15 Mar 2023. An attacker needs administrator access to exploit it, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-28096 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: opensips. 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-2023-28096/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-28096/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2023-28096
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-28096
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2023-28096

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-28096/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.