Search/CVE-2026-80206
CVE — Medium

CVE-2026-80206

NLTK before 3.10.3 contains a regular expression denial of service (ReDoS) vulnerability in the tgrep module. The _tgrep_node_action function compiles user-supplied regular expressions embedded in /regex/ pattern nodes and executes them via re.search against tree node labels without any validation or timeout. An attacker who controls the tgrep pattern (e.g., via tgrep_positions() or tgrep_compile() exposed to external input) can supply a pattern that triggers catastrophic backtracking, causing indefinite CPU saturation that blocks the Python process.

CVSS v3.1
5.9 MEDIUM
EPSS
0.26%
probability of exploitation in 30 days
CISA KEV
Not listed
no confirmed exploitation reported
News coverage
0
sources referencing this CVE
EPSS Trend
Aug 28, 2026Sep 3, 2026
0.01pp
0.25% → 0.26% over 2 tracked changes
CVSS v3.1 Detail
Attack VectorNETWORK
Attack ComplexityHIGH
Privileges RequiredNONE
User InteractionNONE
ScopeUNCHANGED
ConfidentialityNONE
IntegrityNONE
AvailabilityHIGH
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Connections
2 relationships
Timeline
disclosure → media coverage
Aug 26, 2026
Disclosure — published as a CVE record.