CVE-2012-1823

9.8

CVSS
Critical

PUBLISHED

sapi/cgi/cgi_main.c in PHP before 5.3.12 and 5.4.x before 5.4.2, when configured as a CGI script (aka php-cgi), does not properly handle query...

Exploited in the wild Remote Low complexity No user interaction

Vendor: PHP
Product: PHP
Published: May 11, 2012
EPSS: —

Description

sapi/cgi/cgi_main.c in PHP before 5.3.12 and 5.4.x before 5.4.2, when configured as a CGI script (aka php-cgi), does not properly handle query strings that lack an = (equals sign) character, which allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code by placing command-line options in the query string, related to lack of skipping a certain php_getopt for the 'd' case.

php cisa nuclei_scanner metasploit

CVSS scores

CVSS v3.1 9.8 Critical

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

CVSS v2.0 7.5

AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P

Exploitation status

Exploited in the wild

Recorded 2022-03-25 00:00:00 UTC · Source

SSVC decision points

Exploitation: active
Automatable: Yes
Technical impact: total

References

Known exploited vulnerability sources

Catalogues that list this CVE as a known exploited vulnerability.

Source	Added
CISA	Mar 25, 2022

Scanner integrations

Scanner	Reference	Detected
Metasploit	https://github.com/rapid7/metasploit-framework/blob/master/modules/exploits/multi/http/php_cgi_arg_injection.rb	Apr 28, 2025
Nuclei	https://github.com/projectdiscovery/nuclei-templates/blob/main/http/cves/2012/CVE-2012-1823.yaml	Apr 25, 2025