CVE-2025-71408
HIGHDescription
NLTK (Natural Language Toolkit) before version 3.9.3 contains an eval injection vulnerability in the nltk.collocations module that allows an attacker who controls command-line arguments to execute arbitrary Python code. When collocations.py is invoked directly, the __main__ block passes command-line arguments directly to eval() as suffixes of BigramAssocMeasures without allowlist validation or sanitization, enabling an attacker to supply a Python expression that escapes the intended attribute lookup and executes arbitrary code including OS commands via the os module.
How to fix
TridentStack Control can deploy fixes like this automatically across your Windows, macOS, and Linux fleet. See how it works
Remediation is compiled from vendor and distribution security advisories. Always confirm against the linked source for your exact version and platform.
CVSS v3 Vector
Exploitability
Impact
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Exploit Intelligence
Low risk: more likely to be exploited than 10% of all known CVEs.
References
Related Vulnerabilities
Other CWE-95 vulnerabilities, ordered by exploit likelihood. View all
| CVE | Severity | CVSS | EPSS | Exploited | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CVE-2025-24893 | Critical | 9.8 | 100% | KEV | Fix |
| CVE-2024-36401 | Critical | 9.8 | 100% | KEV | Fix |
| CVE-2026-33017 | Critical | 9.8 | 96% | KEV | Fix |
| CVE-2024-21650 | Critical | 10.0 | 93% | - | - |
| CVE-2023-37462 | Critical | 9.9 | 91% | - | Fix |
| CVE-2024-7954 | Critical | 9.8 | 90% | - | Fix |
Common questions
How do I fix CVE-2025-71408?
Upgrade nltk on debian unstable to 3.9.3-1 or later.
Is CVE-2025-71408 being actively exploited?
Not that we know of. CVE-2025-71408 is not in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. Its EPSS score of 0.20% is the estimated probability that it will be exploited in the next 30 days. That is higher than 10% of all scored CVEs.
How severe is CVE-2025-71408?
CVE-2025-71408 has a CVSS v3 base score of 7.8, rated high. CVSS rates the technical impact if the vulnerability is exploited, not how likely that is, so weigh it alongside the exploit-prediction score when you decide what to patch first.
What does CVE-2025-71408 affect?
Published advisories record a fix for nltk (Debian). Only products with a sourced advisory are listed, so treat this as what we can cite rather than a complete inventory.
Embed a live status badge for CVE-2025-71408
Markdown
[](https://tridentstack.com/cve/CVE-2025-71408)HTML
<a href="https://tridentstack.com/cve/CVE-2025-71408"><img src="https://tridentstack.com/cve/badge/CVE-2025-71408.svg" alt="CVE-2025-71408"></a>Find and fix vulnerabilities across your fleet
TridentStack Control continuously scans your Windows, macOS, and Linux fleet for known vulnerabilities, prioritizes them by severity and active exploitation, and patches them automatically.
This product uses NVD data but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD. EPSS scores courtesy of FIRST.org (https://www.first.org/epss). Source: CISA KEV Catalog. Data as of 2026-08-10.