OFFIS DCMTK CVE-2026-44037

The target must parse an attacker-supplied DICOM JSON document whose SQ (sequence) values are nested beyond the parser's (pre-patch unbounded) recursion depth - specifically a document processed by DcmJSONReader via the json2dcm tool or any service converting untrusted DICOM JSON, such as a DICOMweb ingestion endpoint. Limiting factors: exploitation requires the victim process to actually ingest and parse attacker-controlled JSON (UI:P / local file handling in the base CVSS), and impact is strictly availability - a single process crash with no code execution, data disclosure, or integrity loss. Network reach depends on deployment: a DICOMweb service exposes this remotely, whereas standalone json2dcm use requires delivering a malicious file to the operator.

This is a genuine but moderate-priority availability issue, not an urgent emergency. All exploitation signals point to low real-world urgency: SSVC reports Exploitation 'none' and Automatable 'no', the CVE is not on CISA KEV, no EPSS score was provided, and no public PoC is referenced - yielding 'no public exploit identified at time of analysis'. The vendor CVSS 4.0 vector (AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:P/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H) confirms the impact is confined to availability (stack exhaustion / process crash) with no confidentiality or integrity effect, consistent with CWE-674 (uncontrolled recursion). A key tension exists in the attack surface: the CVSS vector specifies AV:L (local), matching the named json2dcm command-line tool that parses files locally, yet the description explicitly cites DICOMweb services converting untrusted DICOM JSON - a network-facing scenario that would effectively make this remotely reachable (AV:N) for any PACS/DICOMweb endpoint accepting JSON. Verify your own deployment: if DICOMweb/JSON ingestion is exposed, treat real exposure as higher than the AV:L score implies, though impact remains a crash, not compromise.

An attacker submits a crafted DICOM JSON document containing deeply nested sequence (SQ) values to a target that parses it - either via the json2dcm CLI tool or a DICOMweb service that converts untrusted JSON payloads. The malicious nesting drives unbounded mutual recursion through parseDataSet/parseElement/parseSequence, exhausting the stack and crashing the process. No public exploit is identified at time of analysis, but the crafted-input requirement is trivial to construct.