Quick answers
- Is CVE-2026-120648 exploited in the wild?
- No. Junglewise Threat Intelligence has no report of CVE-2026-120648 being exploited in the wild.
- How severe is CVE-2026-120648?
- Informational severity, published 4 November 2026.
- Which products and versions are affected?
- Perl CGI before 5.00.
- Is there a fix for CVE-2026-120648?
- Yes: fixed in 5.00. Junglewise finds every place you run it, drafts the upgrade and applies it once you approve.
- How is CVE-2026-120648 attacked?
- It is attacked over the network, in a software library.
- Am I affected by CVE-2026-120648?
- Check whether you run Perl CGI at an affected version. Junglewise does that check for you around the clock: connect your code, cloud and domains, and it matches new vulnerabilities like this one against what you actually run and tells you when one reaches you.
How to fix
- Fixed in: 5.00
Technical details
The CGI module's comment() function wraps text in HTML comment delimiters (<!-- -->) without escaping the text first, allowing sequences like "-->" or "<!--" to break out of or manipulate the comment structure. An attacker can provide input like "text--><script>alert(1)</script>" which closes the comment early and injects markup. The fix, available in CGI 5.00, replaces all "--" sequences with "- -" (dash-space-dash) to prevent any comment-terminating sequences.
Affected products
- Perl CGI before 5.00
Timeline
- 2026-11-04: disclosed
- 2026-11-02: patched