Cpanel::JSON::XS versions before 4.41 for Perl allow type confusion via duplicate object keys when dupkeys_as_arrayref is enabled.
decode_hv() collapses duplicate object keys into an array reference under dupkeys_as_arrayref. The branch reached for a duplicate key tests SvTYPE (old_value) != SVt_RV && SvTYPE (SvRV (old_value)) != SVt_PVAV, which evaluates SvRV(old_value) before establishing that old_value is a reference. When the existing value is a plain scalar rather than an array reference, a non-reference scalar is dereferenced as a reference.
A caller decoding untrusted JSON with dupkeys_as_arrayref enabled is crashed, and the incompatible access follows a pointer taken from attacker controlled scalar contents.
{
"cna_assigner": "CPANSec",
"cwe_ids": [
"CWE-843"
],
"osv_generated_from": "https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/tree/main/cves/2026/9xxx/CVE-2026-9334.json"
}{
"cpe": "cpe:2.3:a:rurban:cpanel\\:\\:json\\:\\:xs:*:*:*:*:*:perl:*:*",
"extracted_events": [
{
"introduced": "0"
},
{
"fixed": "4.41"
}
],
"source": [
"CPE_RANGE",
"REFERENCES"
]
}