CVE-2021-32918

An issue was discovered in Prosody before 0.11.9. Default settings are susceptible to remote unauthenticated denial-of-service (DoS) attacks via memory exhaustion when running under Lua 5.2 or Lua 5.3.

Published: 2021-05-13 Last update: 2026-06-17 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2021-32918 is rated Moderate Risk (55.6/100): CVSS High severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 2.11%). Review affected assets and schedule remediation.

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-2021-32918

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 4.27% 2.11% -2.15%
2 2026-05-30 2.87% 4.27% +1.40%
3 2025-11-21 — 2.87% —

Full EPSS history (23 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2021-32918

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
7.5 3.1 HIGH
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H 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:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
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:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 3.9 3.6 [email protected]
5.0 2.0 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/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:N)
No authentication is required.
Confidentiality impact (C:N)
No confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:N)
No integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:P)
Partial availability impact.
 10.0 2.9 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2021-32918

OS Trackers for CVE-2021-32918

vendor priority summary link
alpine high CVE-2021-32918: 1 source package rows (prosody); 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-2021-32918
debian not yet assigned CVE-2021-32918 not yet assigned priority: Debian including 1 source packages (prosody), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2021-32918
gentoo low CVE-2021-32918: 1 GLSA(s) (202105-15), 1 atom(s) (net-im/prosody); latest impact low. https://bugs.gentoo.org/buglist.cgi?quicksearch=CVE-2021-32918
ubuntu medium CVE-2021-32918 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (prosody), 16 status rows across 16 suites (bionic, focal, groovy, hirsute, impish, jammy, kinetic, lunar, mantic, noble, oracular, plucky, questing, trusty, upstream, xenial): not-affected 6, ignored 4, needed 3, DNE 1, needs-triage 1, released 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2021-32918

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2021-32918

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
prosody prosody < 0.11.9 cpe:2.3:a:prosody:prosody:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
debian debian_linux 10.0 cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:10.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 32 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:32:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 33 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:33:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 34 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:34:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2021-32918

URL Tags
http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2021/05/13/1 Mailing List Third Party Advisory
http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2021/05/14/2 Mailing List Mitigation Third Party Advisory
https://blog.prosody.im/prosody-0.11.9-released/ Release Notes Vendor Advisory
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/6MFFBZWXKPZEVZNQSVJNCUE7WRF3T7DG/
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/GUN63AHEWB2WRROJHU3BVJRWLONCT2B7/
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/LWJ2DG2DFJOEFEWOUN26IMYYWGSA2ZEE/
https://security.gentoo.org/glsa/202105-15 Third Party Advisory
https://www.debian.org/security/2021/dsa-4916 Third Party Advisory
cvelogic Threat Intelligence