Description
league/commonmark versions >= 2.0.0 and < 2.8.4 (patched in 2.9.0) contain a denial of service vulnerability in UniqueSlugNormalizer::normalize(), which restarts its numeric-suffix search from 1 on every slug collision, resulting in O(K^2) time complexity for K headings that collapse to the same base slug. The vulnerable path is reached when HeadingPermalinkExtension, FootnoteExtension, or TableOfContentsExtension is registered. An unauthenticated attacker can force many headings onto a single base slug (e.g., via empty ATX headings, identical heading text, or punctuation-only headings) in a small Markdown document, consuming excessive CPU and denying service.
Published: 2026-09-07
Score: 8.7 High
EPSS: n/a
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

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History

Mon, 07 Sep 2026 13:00:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
Description league/commonmark versions >= 2.0.0 and < 2.8.4 (patched in 2.9.0) contain a denial of service vulnerability in UniqueSlugNormalizer::normalize(), which restarts its numeric-suffix search from 1 on every slug collision, resulting in O(K^2) time complexity for K headings that collapse to the same base slug. The vulnerable path is reached when HeadingPermalinkExtension, FootnoteExtension, or TableOfContentsExtension is registered. An unauthenticated attacker can force many headings onto a single base slug (e.g., via empty ATX headings, identical heading text, or punctuation-only headings) in a small Markdown document, consuming excessive CPU and denying service.
Title commonmark 2.0.0 through 2.8.3 Denial of Service via Slug Collision
First Time appeared Thephpleague
Thephpleague commonmark
Weaknesses CWE-407
CPEs cpe:2.3:a:thephpleague:commonmark:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
Vendors & Products Thephpleague
Thephpleague commonmark
References
Metrics cvssV3_1

{'score': 7.5, 'vector': 'CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H'}

cvssV4_0

{'score': 8.7, 'vector': 'CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N'}


Subscriptions

Thephpleague Commonmark
cve-icon MITRE

Status: PUBLISHED

Assigner: VulnCheck

Published:

Updated: 2026-09-07T12:53:53.194Z

Reserved: 2026-09-07T12:34:31.457Z

Link: CVE-2026-86434

cve-icon Vulnrichment

No data.

cve-icon NVD

Status : Received

Published: 2026-09-07T13:20:42.870

Modified: 2026-09-07T13:20:42.870

Link: CVE-2026-86434

cve-icon Redhat

No data.

cve-icon OpenCVE Enrichment

No data.

Weaknesses
  • CWE-407

    Inefficient Algorithmic Complexity