curl < 7.84.0 supports "chained" HTTP compression algorithms, meaning that a serverresponse can be compressed multiple times and potentially with different algorithms. The number of acceptable "links" in this "decompression chain" was unbounded, allowing a malicious server to insert a virtually unlimited number of compression steps.The use of such a decompression chain could result in a "malloc bomb", makingcurl end up spending enormous amounts of allocated heap memory, or trying toand returning out of memory errors.
The product allocates a reusable resource or group of resources on behalf of an actor without imposing any restrictions on the size or number of resources that can be allocated, in violation of the intended security policy for that actor.