CVE-2026-23962Mastodon vulnerable to Denial of Service from a single post (client/server)
- 7.5HighCVSS base score
- 0.55%Exploitation in 30 daysEPSS · top 54% of all CVEs
- NoKnown exploitednot in CISA's KEV catalog
- NonePublic exploitsnone known yet
Description
Mastodon is a free, open-source social network server based on ActivityPub. Mastodon versions before v4.3.18, v4.4.12, and v4.5.5 do not have a limit on the maximum number of poll options for remote posts, allowing attackers to create polls with a very large amount of options, greatly increasing resource consumption. Depending on the number of poll options, an attacker can cause disproportionate resource usage in both Mastodon servers and clients, potentially causing Denial of Service either server-side or client-side. Mastodon versions v4.5.5, v4.4.12, v4.3.18 are patched.
Timeline
ID reserved
By GitHub_M
- 3 days later
· 3 days later
Published
Changes after publication (a new score, a public exploit, EPSS crossing 1, 10 or 50 %, leaving KEV) are kept since November 2026; earlier ones are not known.
Scores
| Scored by | CVSS | Score | Vector |
|---|---|---|---|
| GitHub_MCNA (assigner) | 3.1 | High7.5 | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H |
| NVDNVD · Analyzed | 3.1 | High7.5 | CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H |
- EPSS (exploitation in 30 days)
- 0.55% · top 54% of all CVEs (12 Nov 2026)
- CISA SSVC
- Exploitation: none · Automatable: yes · Technical impact: partial
The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: High 7.5.
Affected products
References
References4
- https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/security/advisories/GHSA-gg8q-rcg7-p79g (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_CONFIRM
- https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/releases/tag/v4.3.18 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISC
- https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/releases/tag/v4.4.12 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISC
- https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/releases/tag/v4.5.5 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISC
Sources
The same CVE in the primary databases and aggregators, to check against.
- CVE.org record (opens in a new tab)
- CVE List JSON (GitHub) (opens in a new tab)
- NVD (opens in a new tab)
- FIRST EPSS (opens in a new tab)
- EUVD EUVD-2026-4208 (opens in a new tab)
- OSV.dev (opens in a new tab)
- GitHub Advisories (opens in a new tab)
- CIRCL Vulnerability-Lookup (opens in a new tab)
Badge for a README or a ticket
[](https://cveledger.app/cve/CVE-2026-23962)Record last updated .