CVE-2019-12970 — squirrelmail: improper handling of RCDATA and RAWTEXT type elements causing XSS

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MEDIUM

squirrelmail: improper handling of RCDATA and RAWTEXT type elements causing XSS

Published Jul 1, 2019

6.3

MEDIUM

CVSS 3.0

EPSS 1.82%

Description

XSS was discovered in SquirrelMail through 1.4.22 and 1.5.x through 1.5.2. Due to improper handling of RCDATA and RAWTEXT type elements, the built-in sanitization mechanism can be bypassed. Malicious script content from HTML e-mail can be executed within the application context via crafted use of (for example) a NOEMBED, NOFRAMES, NOSCRIPT, or TEXTAREA element.

Affected products

Product	Package	State	Advisory
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5	squirrelmail	Out of support scope	n/a

Remediation

Red Hat statement

This issue affects the versions of squirrelmail as shipped with Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 is now in Extended Life Phase of the support and maintenance life cycle. This issue is not currently planned to be addressed in future updates. For additional information, refer to the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Life Cycle: https://access.redhat.com/support/policy/updates/errata/.

Metrics

1.82% 0.01819

Estimated probability of exploitation in the wild in the next 30 days (FIRST EPSS). As of Oct 2, 2026.

EPSS probability 0.01819

Score over time

2021–2026

EPSS v1
EPSS v5
EPSS v2
EPSS v3

Percentile over time

EPSS v1
EPSS v5
EPSS v2
EPSS v3

Table of values (13 key points)

Flat stretches are collapsed; showing up to 120 newest points.

Date	Score	Percentile	Model
Oct 2, 2026	1.82% (0.01819)	77.97th	v5 (v2026.06.15)
Sep 20, 2026	1.82% (0.01819)	77.77th	v5 (v2026.06.15)
Jul 20, 2024	1.02% (0.01018)	83.93th	v3 (v2023.03.01)
Jun 24, 2024	1.02% (0.01018)	83.82th	v3 (v2023.03.01)
Sep 3, 2023	1.25% (0.01246)	83.85th	v3 (v2023.03.01)
Mar 7, 2023	0.68% (0.00682)	76.91th	v3 (v2023.03.01)
Mar 6, 2023	1.02% (0.01018)	40.69th	v2 (v2022.01.01)
Apr 1, 2022	1.02% (0.01018)	36.86th	v2 (v2022.01.01)
Feb 4, 2022	4.13% (0.04134)	68.25th	v2 (v2022.01.01)
Feb 3, 2022	5.36% (0.05363)	79.74th	v1
Jan 6, 2022	5.36% (0.05363)	79.54th	v1
Jan 5, 2022	1.25% (0.01247)	69.74th	v5 (v2026.06.15)
Apr 14, 2021	1.25% (0.01247)	0.00th	v1

Weaknesses (1)

CWE-79

Cross-site Scripting (XSS)

References (9)

http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/153495/SquirrelMail-1.4.22-Cross-Site-Scripting.html
x_refsource_MISCExploitThird Party AdvisoryVDB Entry
https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2019-12970
Vendor Advisory
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1726498
Issue Tracking
https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2019/08/msg00000.html
mailing-listx_refsource_MLIST
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-12970
https://seclists.org/bugtraq/2019/Jul/0
mailing-listx_refsource_BUGTRAQExploitMailing ListThird Party Advisory
https://seclists.org/bugtraq/2019/Jul/50
mailing-listx_refsource_BUGTRAQ
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2019-12970
https://www.syss.de/fileadmin/dokumente/Publikationen/Advisories/SYSS-2019-016.txt
x_refsource_MISCExploitThird Party Advisory

Link	Providers	Tags
http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/153495/SquirrelMail-1.4.22-Cross-Site-Scripting.html		x_refsource_MISCExploitThird Party AdvisoryVDB Entry
https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2019-12970		Vendor Advisory
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1726498		Issue Tracking
https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2019/08/msg00000.html		mailing-listx_refsource_MLIST
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-12970
https://seclists.org/bugtraq/2019/Jul/0		mailing-listx_refsource_BUGTRAQExploitMailing ListThird Party Advisory
https://seclists.org/bugtraq/2019/Jul/50		mailing-listx_refsource_BUGTRAQ
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2019-12970
https://www.syss.de/fileadmin/dokumente/Publikationen/Advisories/SYSS-2019-016.txt		x_refsource_MISCExploitThird Party Advisory