CWE-176

Improper Handling of Unicode Encoding

The product does not properly handle when an input contains Unicode encoding.

CVE-2026-44288 (GCVE-0-2026-44288)

Vulnerability from cvelistv5 – Published: 2026-05-13 14:37 – Updated: 2026-05-13 18:33
VLAI
Title
protobufjs: Overlong UTF-8 decoding
Summary
protobufjs compiles protobuf definitions into JavaScript (JS) functions. Prior to 7.5.6 and 8.0.2, protobufjs includes a minimal UTF-8 decoder that accepted overlong UTF-8 byte sequences and decoded them to their canonical characters instead of replacing them. An attacker who can provide protobuf binary data decoded through the affected UTF-8 path may be able to bypass application-level checks that inspect raw bytes before protobuf string decoding. For example, bytes that do not contain certain ASCII characters could decode to strings containing those characters. This vulnerability is fixed in 7.5.6 and 8.0.2.
SSVC
Exploitation: none Automatable: yes Technical Impact: partial
CISA Coordinator (v2.0.3)
CWE
  • CWE-176 - Improper Handling of Unicode Encoding
Assigner
References
Impacted products
Vendor Product Version
protobufjs protobuf.js Affected: < 7.5.6
Affected: >= 8.0.0, < 8.0.2
Create a notification for this product.
Show details on NVD website

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CVE-2026-45062 (GCVE-0-2026-45062)

Vulnerability from cvelistv5 – Published: 2026-06-10 17:38 – Updated: 2026-06-10 17:38
VLAI
Title
FrankenPHP: Unsafe Unicode Handling in CGI Path Splitting Allows Execution of Non-PHP Files
Summary
FrankenPHP is a modern application server for PHP. From version 1.11.2 to before version 1.12.3, the splitPos() function in cgi.go misuses golang.org/x/text/search with search.IgnoreCase when the request path contains a non-ASCII byte. Two distinct flaws in that fallback let an attacker mislead FrankenPHP into treating a non-.php file as a .php script. In any deployment where the attacker can place content into a file served by FrankenPHP (uploads, file storage, etc.), this can be escalated to remote code execution by crafting a URL whose path triggers either flaw. This issue has been patched in version 1.12.3.
CWE
  • CWE-20 - Improper Input Validation
  • CWE-176 - Improper Handling of Unicode Encoding
  • CWE-178 - Improper Handling of Case Sensitivity
Assigner
References
Impacted products
Vendor Product Version
php frankenphp Affected: >= 1.11.2, < 1.12.3
Create a notification for this product.
Show details on NVD website

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CVE-2026-7040 (GCVE-0-2026-7040)

Vulnerability from cvelistv5 – Published: 2026-04-27 12:29 – Updated: 2026-05-01 16:03
VLAI
Title
Text::Minify::XS versions from 0.3.0 before 0.7.8 for Perl have heap overflow when processing some malformed UTF-8 characters
Summary
Text::Minify::XS versions from 0.3.0 before 0.7.8 for Perl have a heap overflow when processing some malformed UTF-8 characters. The minify functions mishandled some malformed UTF-8 characters, leading to heap corruption. Note that the minify_utf8 function is an alias for minify.
SSVC
Exploitation: none Automatable: yes Technical Impact: partial
CISA Coordinator (v2.0.3)
CWE
  • CWE-176 - Improper Handling of Unicode Encoding
  • CWE-122 - Heap-based Buffer Overflow
Assigner
Impacted products
Vendor Product Version
RRWO Text::Minify::XS Affected: 0.3.0 , < 0.7.8 (custom)
Create a notification for this product.
Credits
CPANSec
Show details on NVD website

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Mitigation ID: MIT-44

Phase: Architecture and Design

Strategy: Input Validation

Description:

  • Avoid making decisions based on names of resources (e.g. files) if those resources can have alternate names.
Mitigation ID: MIT-5

Phase: Implementation

Strategy: Input Validation

Description:

  • Assume all input is malicious. Use an "accept known good" input validation strategy, i.e., use a list of acceptable inputs that strictly conform to specifications. Reject any input that does not strictly conform to specifications, or transform it into something that does.
  • When performing input validation, consider all potentially relevant properties, including length, type of input, the full range of acceptable values, missing or extra inputs, syntax, consistency across related fields, and conformance to business rules. As an example of business rule logic, "boat" may be syntactically valid because it only contains alphanumeric characters, but it is not valid if the input is only expected to contain colors such as "red" or "blue."
  • Do not rely exclusively on looking for malicious or malformed inputs. This is likely to miss at least one undesirable input, especially if the code's environment changes. This can give attackers enough room to bypass the intended validation. However, denylists can be useful for detecting potential attacks or determining which inputs are so malformed that they should be rejected outright.
Mitigation ID: MIT-20

Phase: Implementation

Strategy: Input Validation

Description:

  • Inputs should be decoded and canonicalized to the application's current internal representation before being validated (CWE-180). Make sure that the application does not decode the same input twice (CWE-174). Such errors could be used to bypass allowlist validation schemes by introducing dangerous inputs after they have been checked.
CAPEC-71: Using Unicode Encoding to Bypass Validation Logic

An attacker may provide a Unicode string to a system component that is not Unicode aware and use that to circumvent the filter or cause the classifying mechanism to fail to properly understanding the request. That may allow the attacker to slip malicious data past the content filter and/or possibly cause the application to route the request incorrectly.

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