VulnerabilityPublished 27 Mar 2024Updated 4 Nov 2025

CVE-2023-46046: libminizinc · NULL Pointer Dereference

Affects libminizincSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 5.5 Medium : upgrade to 2.8.0 when convenient.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 12:54 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

5.5Medium

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 20% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.
Patch: Available – fixed in 2.8.0

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

Attack Vector: Local
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: Low
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: None
Integrity: None
Availability: High

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Local: The vulnerable component is not bound to the network stack and the attacker’s path is via read/write/execute capabilities. Either: the attacker exploits the vulnerability by accessing the target system locally (e.g., keyboard, console), or remotely (e.g., SSH); or the attacker relies on User Interaction by another person to perform actions required to exploit the vulnerability (e.g., tricking a legitimate user into opening a malicious document).
Attack Complexity: Low: Specialized access conditions or extenuating circumstances do not exist. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable component.
Privileges Required: Low: The attacker is authorized with (i.e., requires) privileges that provide basic user capabilities that could normally affect only settings and files owned by a user. Alternatively, an attacker with Low privileges may have the ability to cause an impact only to non-sensitive resources.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without any interaction from any user.
Scope: Unchanged: An exploited vulnerability can only affect resources managed by the same security authority. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are either the same, or both are managed by the same security authority.
Confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the impacted component.
Integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the impacted component.
Availability: High: There is total loss of availability, resulting in the attacker being able to fully deny access to resources in the impacted component; this loss is either sustained (while the attacker continues to deliver the attack) or persistent (the condition persists even after the attack has completed). Alternatively, the attacker has the ability to deny some availability, but the loss of availability presents a direct, serious consequence to the impacted component (e.g., the attacker cannot disrupt existing connections, but can prevent new connections; the attacker can repeatedly exploit a vulnerability that, in each instance of a successful attack, leaks a only small amount of memory, but after repeated exploitation causes a service to become completely unavailable).

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 27 Mar 2024
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 26 Oct 2026.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC or the CVSS exploit maturity reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

Upgrade minizinc/libminizinc to 2.8.0.

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
GitHubminizinc/libminizinc`pkg:github/minizinc/libminizinc`Other threats	Affected <2.8.0	Fixed in 2.8.0

Check your own hosts for these packages with threat-finder (opens in a new tab), our free open-source scanner.

AI-suggested

Restrict access to systems running MiniZinc, especially those processing .mzn files automatically or continuously, to trusted users only.
Implement strict file validation and integrity checks on .mzn files before processing to prevent malicious inputs.
Monitor MiniZinc process stability and implement automated restarts or alerts on crashes to minimize downtime.
Isolate MiniZinc processing environments in sandboxed or containerized setups to limit impact of crashes.
6. Limit network access to MiniZinc services to reduce local or adjacent network attack opportunities. 7. Conduct internal audits to identify any unattended or long-running MiniZinc processes that could be targeted. 8. Educate users and administrators about the potential for denial of service via crafted .mzn files to improve detection and response.

Description

An issue in MiniZinc before 2.8.0 allows a NULL pointer dereference via ti_expr in a crafted .mzn file. NOTE: this is disputed because there is no common libminizinc use case in which an unattended process is supposed to run forever to process a series of atttacker-controlled .mzn files.

Impact

For European organizations, the primary impact is denial of service in environments where MiniZinc is used to process .mzn files automatically or in batch mode, such as academic research labs, industrial optimization, or scheduling systems. While confidentiality and integrity are not affected, availability disruptions could delay critical decision-making processes or automated workflows. Organizations relying on MiniZinc in production or continuous integration environments could face operational interruptions. Given the low privilege and local/adjacent network attack vector, exploitation would require some level of access to the MiniZinc processing environment, limiting remote attack feasibility. However, insider threats or compromised internal systems could leverage this vulnerability to cause service outages. The lack of known exploits and the disputed nature of the vulnerability's practical impact reduce immediate risk but do not eliminate the need for caution in sensitive or high-availability environments.

Summary

CVE-2023-46046 identifies a NULL pointer dereference vulnerability in MiniZinc versions prior to 2.8.0, specifically triggered via the ti_expr component when parsing a maliciously crafted .mzn file. MiniZinc is a constraint modeling language and solver used primarily in research, academia, and some industrial optimization tasks. The vulnerability corresponds to CWE-476 (NULL Pointer Dereference), which can lead to application crashes and denial of service (DoS). The CVSS 3.1 base score is 5.5 (medium), with an attack vector of local or adjacent network (AV:L), low attack complexity (AC:L), requiring low privileges (PR:L), no user interaction (UI:N), unchanged scope (S:U), no impact on confidentiality or integrity (C:N, I:N), but high impact on availability (A:H). The vulnerability is disputed because typical MiniZinc usage does not involve unattended processes running indefinitely to process attacker-controlled input files, limiting practical exploitation scenarios. No public exploit code or known active exploitation has been reported. No official patches or fixes have been linked yet, suggesting users should monitor vendor advisories. This vulnerability primarily risks denial of service by crashing MiniZinc processes, which could disrupt automated optimization workflows or services relying on MiniZinc for constraint solving.

CWE-476NULL Pointer Dereference (opens in a new tab)
Base weaknessLikelihood of exploit: MediumCWE Top 25 (2025): #13OWASP Top 10 A10:2025: Mishandling of Exceptional Conditions (opens in a new tab)
The product dereferences a pointer that it expects to be valid but is NULL.
Implementation
For any pointers that could have been modified or provided from a function that can return NULL, check the pointer for NULL before use. When working with a multithreaded or otherwise asynchronous environment, ensure that proper locking APIs are used to lock before the check, and unlock when it has finished.
Requirements
Select a programming language that is not susceptible to these issues.
Implementation
Check the results of all functions that return a value and verify that the value is non-null before acting upon it.
OWASP Cheat Sheets
Logging (opens in a new tab)
Error Handling (opens in a new tab)
OWASP ASVS 4.0.3
V11.1.7 (opens in a new tab)
From MITRE CWE, MITRE CAPEC and OWASP (Top 10, OpenCRE).

References

Community reviews

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 4 Nov 2025, 18:58 UTC

WeaknessesCWE-476

Technical details

References

Community reviews

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