Description
A flaw was found in dnsmasq before version 2.83. When receiving a query, dnsmasq does not check for an existing pending request for the same name and forwards a new request. By default, a maximum of 150 pending queries can be sent to upstream servers, so there can be at most 150 queries for the same name. This flaw allows an off-path attacker on the network to substantially reduce the number of attempts that it would have to perform to forge a reply and have it accepted by dnsmasq. This issue is mentioned in the "Birthday Attacks" section of RFC5452. If chained with CVE-2020-25684, the attack complexity of a successful attack is reduced. The highest threat from this vulnerability is to data integrity.
Published: 2021-01-20
Score: 3.7 Low
EPSS: < 1% Very Low
KEV: No
Impact: n/a
Action: n/a
AI Analysis

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Remediation

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Tracking

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Advisories
Source ID Title
Debian DSA Debian DSA DSA-4844-1 dnsmasq security update
EUVD EUVD EUVD-2020-18348 A flaw was found in dnsmasq before version 2.83. When receiving a query, dnsmasq does not check for an existing pending request for the same name and forwards a new request. By default, a maximum of 150 pending queries can be sent to upstream servers, so there can be at most 150 queries for the same name. This flaw allows an off-path attacker on the network to substantially reduce the number of attempts that it would have to perform to forge a reply and have it accepted by dnsmasq. This issue is mentioned in the "Birthday Attacks" section of RFC5452. If chained with CVE-2020-25684, the attack complexity of a successful attack is reduced. The highest threat from this vulnerability is to data integrity.
Ubuntu USN Ubuntu USN USN-4698-1 Dnsmasq vulnerabilities
History

Tue, 04 Nov 2025 20:30:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
References

Subscriptions

Arista Eos
Debian Debian Linux
Fedoraproject Fedora
Redhat Enterprise Linux Rhel Aus Rhel E4s Rhel Eus Rhel Tus Rhev Hypervisor
Thekelleys Dnsmasq
cve-icon MITRE

Status: PUBLISHED

Assigner: redhat

Published:

Updated: 2025-11-04T19:12:14.331Z

Reserved: 2020-09-16T00:00:00.000Z

Link: CVE-2020-25686

cve-icon Vulnrichment

No data.

cve-icon NVD

Status : Modified

Published: 2021-01-20T17:15:13.000

Modified: 2025-11-04T20:15:57.490

Link: CVE-2020-25686

cve-icon Redhat

Severity : Moderate

Publid Date: 2021-01-19T00:00:00Z

Links: CVE-2020-25686 - Bugzilla

cve-icon OpenCVE Enrichment

No data.

Weaknesses