---
id: "CVE-2026-115824"
kind: "vulnerability"
aliases: ["CVE-2026-115824"]
title: "Starman: unbounded chunked request buffering lets one client exhaust memory"
severity: "high"
cvss: null
epss: null
exploited: false
status: "open"
category: "runtime"
products: []
ecosystems: []
tags: ["perl", "psgi", "runtime", "self-hosted", "starman"]
not_affected_if: ["default-config"]
published_at: "2026-10-25T17:17:01+00:00"
first_seen_at: "2026-10-25T17:42:01+00:00"
updated_at: "2026-10-25T17:43:49+00:00"
sources: [{"source": "nvd", "url": "https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-115824", "first_seen_at": "2026-10-25T17:42:01+00:00"}]
---

# Starman: unbounded chunked request buffering lets one client exhaust memory

Starman, a Perl PSGI web server, buffers each chunk of a chunked HTTP request body in memory with no size limit, and accepts chunk-size lines of unlimited length. A single remote client can keep sending data and grow the server's memory until the worker runs out, causing denial of service.

_Summary, check and fix written by a model from the sources; labelled as such._

## How to check

- Run `perl -MStarman -e 'print $Starman::VERSION'` or `cpanm --info Starman` to read the installed version
- Check the lockfile or `cpanfile.snapshot` for the `Starman` version

## Fix

- Upgrade Starman to `0.4019` or later
- Until upgraded, put a reverse proxy in front that caps request body size and rejects oversized chunked requests

## Timeline

- 2026-10-25T17:42:01+00:00 nvd https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-115824

## From the sources

Starman versions before 0.4019 for Perl allow memory exhaustion via unbounded buffering of chunked request bodies.

The chunked body decoder keeps each chunk in memory until the whole chunk and its CRLF have arrived, and sets no limit on the length of a chunk-size line. A client that declares a huge chunk size and streams data, or sends a chunk-size line that never ends, grows the buffer for as long as it keeps sending.

A remote attacker can exhaust worker memory with a single connection.

---

_Free to read at a human pace. An API with keys and an MCP server are in preparation; early access: hello@infrastack.ai_