CVE-2011-1521: The urllib and urllib2 modules in Python 2.x before 2.7.2 and 3.x before 3.2.1 process Location headers tha...

Security readout for executives and security teams

This flaw affects older Python URL-fetching libraries. A remote site could redirect a Python application from a normal URL to a local file-style URL, potentially exposing sensitive local data or exhausting resources if the application trusts and returns fetched content. Exposure is most likely in legacy Python 2.x or early Python 3.x applications that fetch untrusted URLs with urllib or urllib2 and consume or return redirected content. Treat as moderate priority for legacy systems. The main business risk is older Python services fetching untrusted URLs, where redirects could turn a routine request into local data exposure or resource exhaustion. Mitigation focus: Upgrade affected Python runtimes to 2.7.2, 3.2.1, or vendor-supported fixed packages.; Apply relevant operating system vendor security updates where Python is distro-managed.; Review vendor advisories before relying on backported package version numbers..

Prepared

Jun 24, 2026, 13:28 UTC (UTC+00:00)

Generated from the cited source records. This long-tail analysis has not been individually reviewed by a named human.