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No exploitation reported

CVE-2016-3705

No exploitation reported by the sources we read.

  • Published2016-05-17
  • WeaknessCWE-20

Am I affected?

With a domain, we read the version its public headers and pages expose. A distribution build can carry the fix under an older number.

Description

The (1) xmlParserEntityCheck and (2) xmlParseAttValueComplex functions in parser.c in libxml2 2.9.3 do not properly keep track of the recursion depth, which allows context-dependent attackers to cause a denial of service (stack consumption and application crash) via a crafted XML document containing a large number of nested entity references.

Timeline

dates in UTC
  1. 2016-05-1714:08CVE publishedNVD

Observed activity

isMalicious corpus · updated 2026-10-23 21:37 UTC
Indicators tagged with this CVE, per day0 indicators over 7 days
Block these indicators
  • Firewall list (EDL, text): https://api.ismalicious.com/edl/cve/CVE-2016-3705?format=txt
  • CSV export: https://api.ismalicious.com/edl/cve/CVE-2016-3705?format=csv
  • TAXII collection of exploited CVEs
  • The EDL and CSV take an API key on the Pro plan.

Versions per branch

NVD
Canonical ubuntu linux
BranchAffectedFixed in
12.4= 12.04no fix published
14.4= 14.04no fix published
15.10= 15.10no fix published
16.4= 16.04no fix published
Debian debian linux
BranchAffectedFixed in
8.0= 8.0no fix published
Hp icewall federation agent
BranchAffectedFixed in
3.0= 3.0no fix published

3 more products in the sources.

as publishedRanges as NVD and OSV publish them; a distribution’s build can be fixed under an older number.

Fix

No fix published by the sources we read yet. NVD record

Detection

Nuclei template
none so far
ProjectDiscovery
Exploit-DB
no entry
Exploit-DB
Proof-of-concept repositories
none listed
PoC-in-GitHub

Sources

  • NVDCVSS 3.07.5read 2026-10-23
  • NVDCVSS 2.05read 2026-10-23
  • NVDweakness (CWE)CWE-20read 2026-10-23
  • FIRST EPSSEPSS score5.1 %2026-10-23

Technical details

CVSS v3 Vector
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Published
2016-05-17
Last Modified
2026-06-17
NVD status
Modified

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2016-3705?

The (1) xmlParserEntityCheck and (2) xmlParseAttValueComplex functions in parser.c in libxml2 2.9.3 do not properly keep track of the recursion depth, which allows context-dependent attackers to cause a denial of service (stack consumption and application crash) via a crafted XML document containing a large number of nested entity references.

Is CVE-2016-3705 actively exploited?

Active exploitation of CVE-2016-3705 has not been confirmed. Its EPSS score was 5.1% on 2026-10-23, the estimated probability of exploitation in the next 30 days.

What is the CVSS score for CVE-2016-3705?

CVE-2016-3705 has a CVSS v3 base score of 7.5 (HIGH severity), with vector string CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H.

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