CVE-2019-10163

A Vulnerability has been found in PowerDNS Authoritative Server before versions 4.1.9, 4.0.8 allowing a remote, authorized master server to cause a high CPU load or even prevent any further updates to any slave zone by sending a large number of NOTIFY messages. Note that only servers configured as slaves are affected by this issue.

Published: 2019-07-30 Last update: 2026-06-16 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]

Conclusion & alert: CVE-2019-10163 is rated Low Risk (38.6/100): CVSS Medium severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 1.00%). Mandatory action: Monitor for updates and reassess as exploit intelligence or EPSS changes.

Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2019-10163

EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).

# Date Old EPSS score New EPSS score Delta (New - Old)
1 2026-06-15 0.01% 1.00% +1.00%
2 2025-03-17 0.14% 0.01% -0.14%
3 2024-12-20 0.14%

Full EPSS history (9 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2019-10163

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
4.3 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:L)
A normal user session is enough; they don’t have to be admin.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:N)
Data isn’t meaningfully altered or forged.
Availability (A:L)
Might cause slowdowns, glitches, or partial disruption—not a full brick.
2.8 1.4 [email protected]
3.5 3.0 LOW
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:L)
A normal user session is enough; they don’t have to be admin.
User interaction (UI:R)
A real person has to do something—click, install, enable—otherwise it doesn’t land.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:N)
Data isn’t meaningfully altered or forged.
Availability (A:L)
Might cause slowdowns, glitches, or partial disruption—not a full brick.
2.1 1.4 [email protected]
4.0 2.0 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:L/Au:S/C:N/I:N/A:P Click to expand
Access vector (AV:N)
Can be exploited remotely over network reachability.
Access complexity (AC:L)
Exploitation conditions are straightforward and predictable.
Authentication (AU:S)
A single authentication is required.
Confidentiality impact (C:N)
No confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:N)
No integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:P)
Partial availability impact.
8.0 2.9 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2019-10163

OS Trackers for CVE-2019-10163

vendor priority summary link
alpine medium CVE-2019-10163: 1 source package rows (pdns); 7 state rows across 7 repos (3.17-community, 3.18-community, 3.19-community, 3.20-community, 3.21-community, 3.22-community, edge-community); fixed 7, open 0. https://security.alpinelinux.org/vuln/CVE-2019-10163
debian not yet assigned CVE-2019-10163 not yet assigned priority: Debian including 1 source packages (pdns), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2019-10163
suse low CVE-2019-10163 severity low: SUSE including 61 source package names (pdns, pdns-4.1.11-20.1, …), 66 product×package rows across 9 product lines (HPE Helion OpenStack 8, SUSE OpenStack Cloud 8, … (9 product lines)): Fixed 60, Known Not Affected 6. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2019-10163/
ubuntu medium CVE-2019-10163 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (pdns), 19 status rows across 19 suites (bionic, cosmic, disco, eoan, focal, groovy, hirsute, impish, jammy, kinetic, lunar, mantic, noble, oracular, plucky, questing, trusty, upstream, xenial): not-affected 13, needs-triage 3, ignored 2, DNE 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2019-10163

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2019-10163

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
powerdns authoritative >= 4.0.0, < 4.0.8 cpe:2.3:a:powerdns:authoritative:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
powerdns authoritative >= 4.1.0, < 4.1.9 cpe:2.3:a:powerdns:authoritative:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
powerdns authoritative 4.1.0 cpe:2.3:a:powerdns:authoritative:4.1.0:-:*:*:*:*:*:*
opensuse backports sle-15 cpe:2.3:o:opensuse:backports:sle-15:-:*:*:*:*:*:*
opensuse backports sle-15 cpe:2.3:o:opensuse:backports:sle-15:sp1:*:*:*:*:*:*
opensuse leap 15.0 cpe:2.3:o:opensuse:leap:15.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
opensuse leap 15.1 cpe:2.3:o:opensuse:leap:15.1:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2019-10163

cvelogic Threat Intelligence