NLTK version 3.9.4 is vulnerable to a path traversal attack due to an incomplete fix for GitHub Issue #3504. The _UNSAFE_NO_PROTOCOL_RE regex in nltk/data.py checks for literal ../ sequences but fails to account for percent-encoded traversal sequences such as ..%2f. The url2pathname() function decodes these sequences after the validation step, allowing an attacker to bypass the protection. This vulnerability enables an attacker to read arbitrary files accessible to the Python process by controlling the resource name parameter passed to nltk.data.load() or nltk.data.find(). The issue affects applications that rely on NLTK for resource loading, including NLP web applications, Jupyter notebooks, and CLI tools. The default pathsec.ENFORCE=False setting exacerbates the impact by not blocking the file read at the open() stage.
CVE-2026-12243
Score 7.5 from GitHub Security Advisory (severity: HIGH) published 2026-06-30. a secondary CVSS source baseline 7.5; sources differ by 0.0.
- High severity, but no confirmed exploitation yet
No vendor fix yet — apply a workaround or compensating control (WAF / firewall / segmentation) and watch for a patch.
- CVSS v3
- 7.5
- EG Score
- 7.5(high)
- EPSS
- 39.8%
- KEV
- Not listed
Published
June 30, 2026
Last Modified
June 30, 2026
Advisory Details (1)
Auto-updated Jun 30, 2026huntr - The world's first bug bounty platform for AI/ML
https://huntr.com/bounties/39aa9354-54ca-4e77-96da-580eb1fe6ed1Vendor Advisories for CVE-2026-12243(1)
These vendors published their own advisory mentioning this CVE — often with vendor-specific remediation steps + affected product lists not in NVD.
Weakness Classification(1)
MITRE Common Weakness Enumeration — the root-cause categories this CVE belongs to.
Data Freshness Timeline
(refreshed 34× in last 7d / 36× in last 30d)
Each row is a source pipeline that fetched or updated this CVE on that date, with what changed. For example, "NVD update" means NVD published or revised its analysis for this CVE; "MITRE cvelistV5" means we ingested or refreshed it from the CNA feed. Most recent first.
- 2026-07-07 04:18 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-07 04:17 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-06 16:27 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-06 15:06 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-06 15:05 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-06 02:23 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-06 01:54 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-06 01:54 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-05 12:45 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-05 12:44 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-05 02:30 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-05 02:30 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-04 23:35 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-04 23:35 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-04 10:26 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-04 10:26 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-04 06:31 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-03 21:17 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-03 21:17 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-03 08:08 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-03 08:08 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-02 19:00 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-02 18:59 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-02 05:50 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-02 05:50 UTCGHSA enrichment
Show 11 moreShow fewer
- 2026-07-01 16:40 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-01 16:40 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-07-01 15:06 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-01 15:06 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-07-01 03:32 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-07-01 03:31 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-06-30 23:22 UTCEPSS rescore
- 2026-06-30 14:22 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-30 14:22 UTCGHSA enrichment
- 2026-06-30 01:11 UTCEG score recompute
- 2026-06-30 01:10 UTCMITRE cvelistV5first tracked
Related CVEs(same CWE)
Frequently asked(5)
What is CVE-2026-12243?
When was CVE-2026-12243 disclosed?
Is CVE-2026-12243 actively exploited?
What is the CVSS score of CVE-2026-12243?
How do I remediate CVE-2026-12243?
Dependency Blast Radius
Explore the affected products and dependency analysis for CVE-2026-12243
Is Your Infrastructure Affected by CVE-2026-12243?
EchelonGraph automatically scans your cloud infrastructure and maps CVE exposure using blast radius analysis.