CVE-2022-24761 | HTTP Request Smuggling in waitress

Waitress is a Web Server Gateway Interface server for Python 2 and 3. When using Waitress versions 2.1.0 and prior behind a proxy that does not properly validate the incoming HTTP request matches the RFC7230 standard, Waitress and the frontend proxy may disagree on where one request starts and where it ends. This would allow requests to be smuggled via the front-end proxy to waitress and later behavior. There are two classes of vulnerability that may lead to request smuggling that are addressed by this advisory: The use of Python's `int()` to parse strings into integers, leading to `+10` to be parsed as `10`, or `0x01` to be parsed as `1`, where as the standard specifies that the string should contain only digits or hex digits; and Waitress does not support chunk extensions, however it was discarding them without validating that they did not contain illegal characters. This vulnerability has been patched in Waitress 2.1.1. A workaround is available. When deploying a proxy in front of waitress, turning on any and all functionality to make sure that the request matches the RFC7230 standard. Certain proxy servers may not have this functionality though and users are encouraged to upgrade to the latest version of waitress instead.

Published: 2022-03-17 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]

Conclusion & alert: CVE-2022-24761 is rated Moderate Risk (50.1/100): CVSS High severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.35%). Mandatory action: 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-2022-24761

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 2026-05-03 0.35% 0.35% -0.00%
2 2026-03-05 0.26% 0.35% +0.09%
3 2025-12-11 0.26%

Full EPSS history (16 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2022-24761

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:H/A:N 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:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.
3.9 3.6 [email protected]
7.5 3.1 HIGH
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N 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:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.
3.9 3.6 [email protected]
5.0 2.0 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:N 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:P)
Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:N)
No availability impact.
10.0 2.9 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2022-24761

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2022-24761

GHSA-4f7p-27jc-3c36 · Severity: high · Ecosystem: pip — HTTP Request Smuggling in waitress

OS Trackers for CVE-2022-24761

vendor priority summary link
debian not yet assigned CVE-2022-24761 not yet assigned priority: Debian including 1 source packages (waitress), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2022-24761
redhat high https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2022-24761
suse high CVE-2022-24761 severity important: SUSE including 15 source package names (1.10.1.16.4.5.328:python3-waitress-1.4.3-150000.3.6.1, python-waitress-1.4.3-3.6.1, …), 54 product×package rows across 46 product lines (Container ses/7.1/cephcsi/cephcsi, Container ses/7.1/rook/ceph, … (46 product lines)): Fixed 54. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2022-24761/
ubuntu medium CVE-2022-24761 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (waitress), 7 status rows across 7 suites (bionic, focal, impish, jammy, trusty, upstream, xenial): released 3, not-affected 2, ignored 1, needs-triage 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2022-24761

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2022-24761

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
agendaless waitress < 2.1.1 cpe:2.3:a:agendaless:waitress:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
debian debian_linux 9.0 cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:9.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2022-24761

cvelogic Threat Intelligence