Description
httputils.rb in WEBrick in Ruby 1.8.1 and 1.8.5, as used in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 and 5, allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (CPU consumption) via a crafted HTTP request. NOTE: this issue exists because of an incomplete fix for CVE-2008-3656.
Fixed in Linux distributions
Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.
Red Hat
Security tracker ↗| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| RHEL 5 | ruby +8 | 1.8.5-5.el5_2.6 | RHSA-2008:0981 |
| RHEL 4 | irb +6 | 1.8.1-7.el4_7.2 | RHSA-2008:0981 |
Public exploits
Exploit or proof-of-concept code for this vulnerability is publicly available, which lowers the bar for attackers. Treat it as a reason to patch sooner.
Third-party code, not reviewed by us. Public PoCs are sometimes fake or contain malware. Read the code first and run it only in an isolated lab, against systems you are authorised to test.
Exploit-DB 1
- Ruby 1.9 - 'WEBrick::HTTP::DefaultFileHandler' Crafted HTTP Request Denial of Service EDB-32222 · dos · Aug 11, 2008 · verified
Sources: PoC-in-GitHub, Metasploit Framework, Exploit-DB — updated daily. Only links are listed; no exploit code is hosted here.
Affected packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Affected | Fixed | Record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| RubyGems | webrick | < 1.3.1 | 1.3.1 | GHSA-wfrc-r6c6-7j9r |
Advisories 1
- RHSA-2008:0981 Red Hat Security Advisory: ruby security update Red Hat Security Advisories (RHSA) · Jun 26, 2026
References
- RHSA-2008:0981 vendor-advisory
- https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=470252
- oval:org.mitre.oval:def:10250 vdb-entry signature
- [oss-security] 20081204 ruby CVE-2008-4310 (Red Hat specific) mailing-list
- 33013 third-party-advisory