# CVE-2026-44031: Uncontrolled recursion in the DCMTK DICOM dataset parser allows unauthenticated remote denial of service

> Remote unauthenticated attackers can crash DCMTK-based DICOM services by sending deeply nested sequences, causing stack exhaustion.

- **Severity:** High 8.7 (`CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 8 Oct 2026
- **Updated:** 8 Oct 2026
- **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2026-44031, GHSA-hxvw-37gr-vg44, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-44031

## What is CVE-2026-44031?

CVE-2026-44031 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in OFFIS DCMTK, published on 8 Oct 2026. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

Uncontrolled recursion in DcmSequenceOfItems::read() and DcmItem::read() in the dcmdata library of OFFIS DCMTK 3.7.0 allows a remote, unauthenticated attacker to cause a denial of service (stack exhaustion and process crash) via a DICOM dataset containing deeply nested sequences (SQ elements). The dataset can be sent in a C-STORE request to storescp, dcmrecv, dcmqrscp, or any other DICOM service built on DCMTK, because the received dataset is parsed before any authentication takes place. Local tools such as dcmdump also crash when opening such a file. The issue is fixed in commit 885ff0f10372bd589b5f44cea974f28a3964cb0f, which adds a configurable sequence nesting depth limit (default 64).

Weakness: CWE-674 (Uncontrolled Recursion)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-44031?


## How do I fix CVE-2026-44031?

No fix has been published for CVE-2026-44031 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2026-44031 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-44031 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2026-44031 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2026-44031 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in OFFIS DCMTK, published on 8 Oct 2026. 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-2026-44031 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: OFFIS DCMTK. 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-2026-44031/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-44031/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-44031
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-44031
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2026-44031

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-44031/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.