CVE-2026-65627

MEDIUMCVSS 6.9/10EPSS 0.25%

Last modified

CVE-2026-65627 is a medium-severity vulnerability rated 6.9/10 on the CVSS scale. Improper Handling of Highly Compressed Data (Data Amplification) vulnerability in potatosalad jose (erlang-jose) allows a remote attacker to exhaust a node's memory with a small crafted JWE token. The jose_jwe_zip:uncompress/2 function in src/jwe/jose_jwe_zip.erl decompresses the DEFLATE-compressed plaintext of a JWE that carries the optional zip: DEF header by calling zlib:inflate/2 on the entire attacker-controlled stream, with no bound on the output size or the inflation ratio. Raw DEFLATE reaches ratios around 1000:1 on highly repetitive input, so a few-kilobyte token inflates to hundreds of megabytes or gigabytes in a single call. Decompression runs automatically during decryption through jose_jwe:block_decrypt/2 (JOSE.JWE.block_decrypt/2 in Elixir), before the recipient can inspect or reject the payload. EPSS estimates a 0.25% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days.

Description

Improper Handling of Highly Compressed Data (Data Amplification) vulnerability in potatosalad jose (erlang-jose) allows a remote attacker to exhaust a node's memory with a small crafted JWE token. The jose_jwe_zip:uncompress/2 function in src/jwe/jose_jwe_zip.erl decompresses the DEFLATE-compressed plaintext of a JWE that carries the optional zip: DEF header by calling zlib:inflate/2 on the entire attacker-controlled stream, with no bound on the output size or the inflation ratio. Raw DEFLATE reaches ratios around 1000:1 on highly repetitive input, so a few-kilobyte token inflates to hundreds of megabytes or gigabytes in a single call. Decompression runs automatically during decryption through jose_jwe:block_decrypt/2 (JOSE.JWE.block_decrypt/2 in Elixir), before the recipient can inspect or reject the payload. With the common asymmetric key-management algorithms (RSA-OAEP, ECDH-ES) an attacker needs only the recipient's public key to craft such a token, so no authentication or secret material is required. A single small token can exhaust the node's memory and crash the BEAM, denying service to all users. This issue affects jose: from 1.0.0 before 1.11.13.

Metrics

Weakness Enumeration

Affected Software

Source: CNA advisory (CVE.org). NVD analysis pending.

VendorProductVersions
potatosaladjose>= 1.0.0, < 1.11.13
potatosaladjose>= a7746ecd4950f85a393136e449a91dac62b5c429, < 857eb8e7f2d33e2c9ca2189e77226561cacaf2ad

References

Timeline

Published
Last Modified
Status
Deferred

Frequently Asked Questions

What is CVE-2026-65627?
Improper Handling of Highly Compressed Data (Data Amplification) vulnerability in potatosalad jose (erlang-jose) allows a remote attacker to exhaust a node's memory with a small crafted JWE token. The jose_jwe_zip:uncompress/2 function in src/jwe/jose_jwe_zip.erl decompresses the DEFLATE-compressed plaintext of a JWE that carries the optional zip: DEF header by calling zlib:inflate/2 on the entire attacker-controlled stream, with no bound on the output size or the inflation ratio. Raw DEFLATE reaches ratios around 1000:1 on highly repetitive input, so a few-kilobyte token inflates to hundreds of megabytes or gigabytes in a single call. Decompression runs automatically during decryption through jose_jwe:block_decrypt/2 (JOSE.JWE.block_decrypt/2 in Elixir), before the recipient can inspect or reject the payload. With the common asymmetric key-management algorithms (RSA-OAEP, ECDH-ES) an attacker needs only the recipient's public key to craft such a token, so no authentication or secret material is required. A single small token can exhaust the node's memory and crash the BEAM, denying service to all users. This issue affects jose: from 1.0.0 before 1.11.13.
How severe is CVE-2026-65627?
CVE-2026-65627 has a CVSS score of 6.9/10 (MEDIUM severity). The EPSS model estimates a 0.25% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days.
How do I fix CVE-2026-65627?
Check the vendor references and advisories linked above for patched versions and mitigation guidance. You can also run a Strix scan to test if your systems are affected.

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Source: NVD / NIST