CVE-2023-33202

Exp

Bouncy Castle for Java before 1.73 contains a potential Denial of Service (DoS) issue within the Bouncy Castle org.bouncycastle.openssl.PEMParser class. This class parses OpenSSL PEM encoded streams containing X.509 certificates, PKCS8 encoded keys, and PKCS7 objects. Parsing a file that has crafted ASN.1 data through the PEMParser causes an OutOfMemoryError, which can enable a denial of service attack. (For users of the FIPS Java API: BC-FJA 1.0.2.3 and earlier are affected; BC-FJA 1.0.2.4 is fixed.)

Published: 2023-11-23 Last update: 2026-06-17 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2023-33202 is rated Exploit Available (57.3/100): CVSS Medium severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.93%). 1 public exploit reference(s) are indexed (Exploit-DB). Public exploits are available—assess exposure, apply mitigations, and prioritize patching.

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

Public exploit references (Exploit-DB) for CVE-2023-33202

EDB-ID Source Kind Published Link
— nvd_ref exploit_tag Exploit-DB ↗

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2023-33202

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 0.16% 0.93% +0.77%
2 2026-06-05 0.14% 0.16% +0.01%
3 2026-05-23 — 0.14% —

Full EPSS history (15 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2023-33202

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
5.5 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:L)
They already need access on the box, or another person has to do something wrong; it’s not a remote drive-by.
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: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:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 1.8 3.6 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2023-33202

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2023-33202

GHSA-wjxj-5m7g-mg7q · Severity: medium · Ecosystem: maven — Bouncy Castle Denial of Service (DoS)

OS Trackers for CVE-2023-33202

vendor priority summary link
debian not yet assigned CVE-2023-33202 not yet assigned priority: Debian including 1 source packages (bouncycastle), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 3, open 2. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2023-33202
redhat medium — https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2023-33202
ubuntu medium CVE-2023-33202 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (bouncycastle), 12 status rows across 12 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, lunar, mantic, noble, oracular, plucky, questing, trusty, upstream, xenial): ignored 5, needed 4, not-affected 2, released 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2023-33202

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2023-33202

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
bouncycastle bouncy_castle_for_java < 1.73 cpe:2.3:a:bouncycastle:bouncy_castle_for_java:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
bouncycastle fips_java_api < 1.0.2.4 cpe:2.3:a:bouncycastle:fips_java_api:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2023-33202

cvelogic Threat Intelligence