CVE-2023-2798 | Denial of service in HtmlUnit

Those using HtmlUnit to browse untrusted webpages may be vulnerable to Denial of service attacks (DoS). If HtmlUnit is running on user supplied web pages, an attacker may supply content that causes HtmlUnit to crash by a stack overflow. This effect may support a denial of service attack.This issue affects htmlunit before 2.70.0.

Published: 2023-05-25 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2023-2798 is rated Low Risk (37.6/100): CVSS High severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.07%). 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-2023-2798

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 2025-11-21 0.34% 0.07% -0.27%
2 2025-11-18 0.06% 0.34% +0.28%
3 2025-04-15 — 0.06% —

Full EPSS history (9 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2023-2798

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]
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]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2023-2798

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2023-2798

GHSA-rc44-5cmh-879m · Severity: high · Ecosystem: maven — Unrestricted recursion in htmlunit

OS Trackers for CVE-2023-2798

vendor priority summary link
redhat medium — https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2023-2798
ubuntu medium CVE-2023-2798 medium priority: Ubuntu including 2 source packages (htmlunit, jenkins-htmlunit-core-js), 24 status rows across 12 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, lunar, mantic, noble, oracular, plucky, questing, trusty, upstream, xenial): DNE 15, needs-triage 7, ignored 2. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2023-2798

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2023-2798

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
htmlunit htmlunit < 2.70.0 cpe:2.3:a:htmlunit:htmlunit:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2023-2798

cvelogic Threat Intelligence