CWE-168 3 CVEs MITRE definition ↗

CWE-168: Improper Handling of Inconsistent Special Elements

Overview

CWE-168 (Improper Handling of Inconsistent Special Elements) documents a weakness type used across vulnerability databases and security assessments. Use the sections below for definition, context, and mapped CVEs.

Security impact
Security impact: Depends on product and context; use CVE records, severity scores, and MITRE guidance to prioritize.

Description

The product does not properly handle input in which an inconsistency exists between two or more special characters or reserved words.

Applicable platforms

Kind Name Class Prevalence OS / CPE
language Not Language-Specific Undetermined

Related CVEs in this database

These CVEs are mapped to this weakness in this database and kept for traceability and search.

CVE Published Summary
CVE-2019-25620 2026-03-23 Tree Studio 2.17 contains a denial of service vulnerability that allows local attackers to crash the application by providing malformed input through the keyboard interface. Attackers can trigger the …
CVE-2023-6245 2023-12-08 The Candid library causes a Denial of Service while parsing a specially crafted payload with 'empty' data type. For example, if the payload is `record { * ; empty }` and the canister interface expec…
CVE-2023-36843 2023-10-12 An Improper Handling of Inconsistent Special Elements vulnerability in the Junos Services Framework (jsf) module of Juniper Networks Junos OS allows an unauthenticated network based attacker to cause…

Previous names

  • Inconsistent Special Elements (2008-04-11)
  • Failure to Resolve Inconsistent Special Elements (2010-12-13)

Content submission

Name
PLOVER
Date
2006-07-19
Version
Draft 3

Content modifications

Date Name Version Importance Comment
2008-07-01 Eric Dalci 1.0 updated Potential_Mitigations, Time_of_Introduction
2008-09-08 CWE Content Team 1.0 updated Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings
2008-10-14 CWE Content Team 1.0.1 updated Description
2009-03-10 CWE Content Team 1.3 updated Relationships
2009-07-27 CWE Content Team 1.5 updated Potential_Mitigations
2010-12-13 CWE Content Team 1.11 updated Name
2011-03-29 CWE Content Team 1.12 updated Potential_Mitigations
2011-06-01 CWE Content Team 1.13 updated Common_Consequences
2012-05-11 CWE Content Team 2.2 updated Relationships
2012-10-30 CWE Content Team 2.3 updated Potential_Mitigations
2014-07-30 CWE Content Team 2.8 updated Relationships
2017-05-03 CWE Content Team 2.11 updated Potential_Mitigations
2017-11-08 CWE Content Team 3.0 updated Applicable_Platforms
2020-02-24 CWE Content Team 4.0 updated Description, Potential_Mitigations, Relationships
2020-06-25 CWE Content Team 4.1 updated Potential_Mitigations
2023-01-31 CWE Content Team 4.10 updated Description, Potential_Mitigations
2023-04-27 CWE Content Team 4.11 updated Relationships
2023-06-29 CWE Content Team 4.12 updated Mapping_Notes
2024-02-29 CWE Content Team 4.14 updated Relationships
2025-12-11 CWE Content Team 4.19 updated Weakness_Ordinalities
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