CVE-2022-37428

PowerDNS Recursor up to and including 4.5.9, 4.6.2 and 4.7.1, when protobuf logging is enabled, has Improper Cleanup upon a Thrown Exception, leading to a denial of service (daemon crash) via a DNS query that leads to an answer with specific properties.

Published: 2022-08-23 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2022-37428 is rated Moderate Risk (49/100): CVSS Medium severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 1.15%). EPSS rose +1.09% over the last day, indicating growing attacker interest. 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-2022-37428

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 0.05% 1.15% +1.09%
2 2025-12-30 0.04% 0.05% +0.02%
3 2025-11-21 — 0.04% —

Full EPSS history (8 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2022-37428

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
6.5 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/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: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:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 2.8 3.6 [email protected]
6.5 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/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: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:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 2.8 3.6 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2022-37428

OS Trackers for CVE-2022-37428

vendor priority summary link
alpine medium CVE-2022-37428: 1 source package rows (pdns-recursor); 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-2022-37428
debian end-of-life CVE-2022-37428 end-of-life priority: Debian including 1 source packages (pdns-recursor), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 4, open 1. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2022-37428
suse medium CVE-2022-37428 severity moderate: SUSE including 2 source package names (pdns-recursor-4.6.3-bp154.2.3.1, pdns-recursor-4.7.2-1.1), 3 product×package rows across 3 product lines (SUSE Package Hub 15 SP4, openSUSE Leap 15.4, openSUSE Tumbleweed): Fixed 3. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2022-37428/
ubuntu medium CVE-2022-37428 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (pdns-recursor), 13 status rows across 13 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, kinetic, lunar, mantic, noble, oracular, plucky, questing, trusty, upstream, xenial): not-affected 6, needs-triage 4, ignored 2, released 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2022-37428

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2022-37428

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
powerdns recursor >= 4.5.0, < 4.5.10 cpe:2.3:a:powerdns:recursor:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
powerdns recursor >= 4.6.0, < 4.6.3 cpe:2.3:a:powerdns:recursor:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
powerdns recursor >= 4.7.0, < 4.7.2 cpe:2.3:a:powerdns:recursor:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 36 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:36:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2022-37428

cvelogic Threat Intelligence