Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2014-8090

critical Nessus Plugin ID 218430

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Synopsis

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed with a vulnerability that the vendor indicates will not be patched.

Description

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed that are impacted by a vulnerability without a vendor supplied patch available.

- The REXML parser in Ruby 1.9.x before 1.9.3 patchlevel 551, 2.0.x before 2.0.0 patchlevel 598, and 2.1.x before 2.1.5 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (CPU and memory consumption) a crafted XML document containing an empty string in an entity that is used in a large number of nested entity references, aka an XML Entity Expansion (XEE) attack. NOTE: this vulnerability exists because of an incomplete fix for CVE-2013-1821 and CVE-2014-8080. (CVE-2014-8090)

Note that Nessus relies on the presence of the package as reported by the vendor.

Solution

There is no known solution at this time.

Plugin Details

Severity: Critical

ID: 218430

File Name: unpatched_CVE_2014_8090.nasl

Version: 1.2

Type: local

Agent: unix

Family: Misc.

Published: 3/4/2025

Updated: 1/28/2026

Supported Sensors: Frictionless Assessment AWS, Frictionless Assessment Azure, Frictionless Assessment Agent, Nessus Agent, Agentless Assessment, Nessus

Risk Information

VPR

Risk Factor: Medium

Score: 6.7

CVSS v2

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 5

Temporal Score: 4.5

Vector: CVSS2#AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P

CVSS Score Source: CVE-2014-8090

CVSS v3

Risk Factor: Critical

Base Score: 9.8

Temporal Score: 9.3

Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Temporal Vector: CVSS:3.0/E:P/RL:U/RC:C

Vulnerability Information

CPE: p-cpe:/a:redhat:enterprise_linux:ruby, cpe:/o:redhat:enterprise_linux:5, cpe:/o:redhat:enterprise_linux:4

Required KB Items: Host/local_checks_enabled, Host/cpu, global_settings/vendor_unpatched, Host/OS/identifier

Exploit Available: true

Exploit Ease: Exploits are available

Vulnerability Publication Date: 11/13/2014

Reference Information

CVE: CVE-2014-8090

Detections

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