Security Advisories (19)
CVE-2023-47100

In Perl before 5.38.2, S_parse_uniprop_string in regcomp.c can write to unallocated space because a property name associated with a \p{...} regular expression construct is mishandled. The earliest affected version is 5.30.0.

CVE-2020-10543 (2020-06-05)

Perl before 5.30.3 on 32-bit platforms allows a heap-based buffer overflow because nested regular expression quantifiers have an integer overflow.

CVE-2020-12723 (2020-06-05)

regcomp.c in Perl before 5.30.3 allows a buffer overflow via a crafted regular expression because of recursive S_study_chunk calls.

CVE-2018-6913 (2018-04-17)

Heap-based buffer overflow in the pack function in Perl before 5.26.2 allows context-dependent attackers to execute arbitrary code via a large item count.

CVE-2023-47039 (2023-10-30)

Perl for Windows relies on the system path environment variable to find the shell (cmd.exe). When running an executable which uses Windows Perl interpreter, Perl attempts to find and execute cmd.exe within the operating system. However, due to path search order issues, Perl initially looks for cmd.exe in the current working directory. An attacker with limited privileges can exploit this behavior by placing cmd.exe in locations with weak permissions, such as C:\ProgramData. By doing so, when an administrator attempts to use this executable from these compromised locations, arbitrary code can be executed.

CVE-2018-18312 (2018-12-05)

Perl before 5.26.3 and 5.28.0 before 5.28.1 has a buffer overflow via a crafted regular expression that triggers invalid write operations.

CVE-2018-18311 (2018-12-07)

Perl before 5.26.3 and 5.28.x before 5.28.1 has a buffer overflow via a crafted regular expression that triggers invalid write operations.

CVE-2017-12883 (2017-09-19)

Buffer overflow in the S_grok_bslash_N function in regcomp.c in Perl 5 before 5.24.3-RC1 and 5.26.x before 5.26.1-RC1 allows remote attackers to disclose sensitive information or cause a denial of service (application crash) via a crafted regular expression with an invalid '\\N{U+...}' escape.

CVE-2015-8853 (2016-05-25)

The (1) S_reghop3, (2) S_reghop4, and (3) S_reghopmaybe3 functions in regexec.c in Perl before 5.24.0 allow context-dependent attackers to cause a denial of service (infinite loop) via crafted utf-8 data, as demonstrated by "a\x80."

CVE-2025-40909 (2025-05-30)

Perl threads have a working directory race condition where file operations may target unintended paths. If a directory handle is open at thread creation, the process-wide current working directory is temporarily changed in order to clone that handle for the new thread, which is visible from any third (or more) thread already running. This may lead to unintended operations such as loading code or accessing files from unexpected locations, which a local attacker may be able to exploit. The bug was introduced in commit 11a11ecf4bea72b17d250cfb43c897be1341861e and released in Perl version 5.13.6

CVE-2016-1238 (2016-08-02)

(1) cpan/Archive-Tar/bin/ptar, (2) cpan/Archive-Tar/bin/ptardiff, (3) cpan/Archive-Tar/bin/ptargrep, (4) cpan/CPAN/scripts/cpan, (5) cpan/Digest-SHA/shasum, (6) cpan/Encode/bin/enc2xs, (7) cpan/Encode/bin/encguess, (8) cpan/Encode/bin/piconv, (9) cpan/Encode/bin/ucmlint, (10) cpan/Encode/bin/unidump, (11) cpan/ExtUtils-MakeMaker/bin/instmodsh, (12) cpan/IO-Compress/bin/zipdetails, (13) cpan/JSON-PP/bin/json_pp, (14) cpan/Test-Harness/bin/prove, (15) dist/ExtUtils-ParseXS/lib/ExtUtils/xsubpp, (16) dist/Module-CoreList/corelist, (17) ext/Pod-Html/bin/pod2html, (18) utils/c2ph.PL, (19) utils/h2ph.PL, (20) utils/h2xs.PL, (21) utils/libnetcfg.PL, (22) utils/perlbug.PL, (23) utils/perldoc.PL, (24) utils/perlivp.PL, and (25) utils/splain.PL in Perl 5.x before 5.22.3-RC2 and 5.24 before 5.24.1-RC2 do not properly remove . (period) characters from the end of the includes directory array, which might allow local users to gain privileges via a Trojan horse module under the current working directory.

CVE-2016-6185 (2016-08-02)

The XSLoader::load method in XSLoader in Perl does not properly locate .so files when called in a string eval, which might allow local users to execute arbitrary code via a Trojan horse library under the current working directory.

CVE-2015-8608 (2017-02-07)

The VDir::MapPathA and VDir::MapPathW functions in Perl 5.22 allow remote attackers to cause a denial of service (out-of-bounds read) and possibly execute arbitrary code via a crafted (1) drive letter or (2) pInName argument.

CVE-2020-10878 (2020-06-05)

Perl before 5.30.3 has an integer overflow related to mishandling of a "PL_regkind[OP(n)] == NOTHING" situation. A crafted regular expression could lead to malformed bytecode with a possibility of instruction injection.

CVE-2018-6798 (2018-04-17)

An issue was discovered in Perl 5.22 through 5.26. Matching a crafted locale dependent regular expression can cause a heap-based buffer over-read and potentially information disclosure.

CVE-2018-6797 (2018-04-17)

An issue was discovered in Perl 5.18 through 5.26. A crafted regular expression can cause a heap-based buffer overflow, with control over the bytes written.

CVE-2018-18314 (2018-12-07)

Perl before 5.26.3 has a buffer overflow via a crafted regular expression that triggers invalid write operations.

CVE-2018-18313 (2018-12-07)

Perl before 5.26.3 has a buffer over-read via a crafted regular expression that triggers disclosure of sensitive information from process memory.

CVE-2017-12837 (2017-09-19)

Heap-based buffer overflow in the S_regatom function in regcomp.c in Perl 5 before 5.24.3-RC1 and 5.26.x before 5.26.1-RC1 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (out-of-bounds write) via a regular expression with a '\\N{}' escape and the case-insensitive modifier.

NAME

Parse::CPAN::Meta - Parse META.yml and META.json CPAN metadata files

VERSION

version 1.4417

SYNOPSIS

#############################################
# In your file

---
name: My-Distribution
version: 1.23
resources:
  homepage: "http://example.com/dist/My-Distribution"


#############################################
# In your program

use Parse::CPAN::Meta;

my $distmeta = Parse::CPAN::Meta->load_file('META.yml');

# Reading properties
my $name     = $distmeta->{name};
my $version  = $distmeta->{version};
my $homepage = $distmeta->{resources}{homepage};

DESCRIPTION

Parse::CPAN::Meta is a parser for META.json and META.yml files, using JSON::PP and/or CPAN::Meta::YAML.

Parse::CPAN::Meta provides three methods: load_file, load_json_string, and load_yaml_string. These will read and deserialize CPAN metafiles, and are described below in detail.

Parse::CPAN::Meta provides a legacy API of only two functions, based on the YAML functions of the same name. Wherever possible, identical calling semantics are used. These may only be used with YAML sources.

All error reporting is done with exceptions (die'ing).

Note that META files are expected to be in UTF-8 encoding, only. When converted string data, it must first be decoded from UTF-8.

METHODS

load_file

my $metadata_structure = Parse::CPAN::Meta->load_file('META.json');

my $metadata_structure = Parse::CPAN::Meta->load_file('META.yml');

This method will read the named file and deserialize it to a data structure, determining whether it should be JSON or YAML based on the filename. The file will be read using the ":utf8" IO layer.

load_yaml_string

my $metadata_structure = Parse::CPAN::Meta->load_yaml_string($yaml_string);

This method deserializes the given string of YAML and returns the first document in it. (CPAN metadata files should always have only one document.) If the source was UTF-8 encoded, the string must be decoded before calling load_yaml_string.

load_json_string

my $metadata_structure = Parse::CPAN::Meta->load_json_string($json_string);

This method deserializes the given string of JSON and the result. If the source was UTF-8 encoded, the string must be decoded before calling load_json_string.

load_string

my $metadata_structure = Parse::CPAN::Meta->load_string($some_string);

If you don't know whether a string contains YAML or JSON data, this method will use some heuristics and guess. If it can't tell, it assumes YAML.

yaml_backend

my $backend = Parse::CPAN::Meta->yaml_backend;

Returns the module name of the YAML serializer. See "ENVIRONMENT" for details.

json_backend

my $backend = Parse::CPAN::Meta->json_backend;

Returns the module name of the JSON serializer. This will either be JSON::PP or JSON. Even if PERL_JSON_BACKEND is set, this will return JSON as further delegation is handled by the JSON module. See "ENVIRONMENT" for details.

FUNCTIONS

For maintenance clarity, no functions are exported by default. These functions are available for backwards compatibility only and are best avoided in favor of load_file.

Load

my @yaml = Parse::CPAN::Meta::Load( $string );

Parses a string containing a valid YAML stream into a list of Perl data structures.

LoadFile

my @yaml = Parse::CPAN::Meta::LoadFile( 'META.yml' );

Reads the YAML stream from a file instead of a string.

ENVIRONMENT

PERL_JSON_BACKEND

By default, JSON::PP will be used for deserializing JSON data. If the PERL_JSON_BACKEND environment variable exists, is true and is not "JSON::PP", then the JSON module (version 2.5 or greater) will be loaded and used to interpret PERL_JSON_BACKEND. If JSON is not installed or is too old, an exception will be thrown.

PERL_YAML_BACKEND

By default, CPAN::Meta::YAML will be used for deserializing YAML data. If the PERL_YAML_BACKEND environment variable is defined, then it is interpreted as a module to use for deserialization. The given module must be installed, must load correctly and must implement the Load() function or an exception will be thrown.

SUPPORT

Bugs / Feature Requests

Please report any bugs or feature requests through the issue tracker at https://github.com/Perl-Toolchain-Gang/Parse-CPAN-Meta/issues. You will be notified automatically of any progress on your issue.

Source Code

This is open source software. The code repository is available for public review and contribution under the terms of the license.

https://github.com/Perl-Toolchain-Gang/Parse-CPAN-Meta

git clone https://github.com/Perl-Toolchain-Gang/Parse-CPAN-Meta.git

AUTHORS

  • Adam Kennedy <adamk@cpan.org>

  • David Golden <dagolden@cpan.org>

CONTRIBUTORS

  • Graham Knop <haarg@haarg.org>

  • Joshua ben Jore <jjore@cpan.org>

  • Karen Etheridge <ether@cpan.org>

  • Neil Bowers <neil@bowers.com>

  • Ricardo Signes <rjbs@cpan.org>

  • Steffen Mueller <smueller@cpan.org>

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

This software is copyright (c) 2015 by Adam Kennedy and Contributors.

This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.