A problem with the implementation of the new serve-stale feature in BIND 9.12 can lead to an assertion failure in rbtdb.c, even when stale-answer-enable is off. Additionally, problematic interaction between the serve-stale feature and NSEC aggressive negative caching can in some cases cause undesirable behavior from named, such as a recursion loop or excessive logging. Deliberate exploitation of this condition could cause operational problems depending on the particular manifestation -- either degradation or denial of service. Affects BIND 9.12.0 and 9.12.1.
Severity
CVSS 3.0
7.5 high
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
EPSS
11% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days; higher than 95% of CVEs (scores of 2026-10-31)