CVE-2026-12261
CVE-2026-12261 updated by NVD
Summary
A vulnerability in `nltk.downloader` in nltk/nltk versions <= 3.9.4 allows for cross-package resource and model poisoning. The downloader extracts package archives into shared namespaces such as `corpora/` and `taggers/` instead of package-isolated roots, and validates package integrity only after the archive has been written and extracted. This design flaw enables one package to overwrite another package's trusted resources within the same namespace, making the changes immediately active through ordinary NLTK APIs. This issue persists across fresh interpreter restarts and can affect downstream workflows, including machine learning pipelines and reproducibility-sensitive environments.
Affected packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Affected versions | Fixed versions |
|---|---|---|---|
| PyPI | nltk | — | 3.10.0 |
Remediation: Upgrade to 3.10.0 or later.
References
Includes data from the GitHub Advisory Database, licensed under CC-BY 4.0.
Includes data from the National Vulnerability Database (NIST). NVD data is in the public domain; this page is not endorsed by NIST.
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EPSS scores provided by the FIRST.org Exploit Prediction Scoring System.