CVE-2025-59043
It is possible to craft a JSON payload to maximize the factor between serialized memory usage and deserialized memory usage, similar to a zip bomb, with factors reaching approximately 35.
Does this matter?
High impact if exploited, but EPSS currently rates exploitation as unlikely (0.65%). Schedule it in the normal patch cycle and watch for a rise in EPSS or a public exploit.
Description
OpenBao is an open source identity-based secrets management system. In OpenBao versions prior to 2.4.1, JSON objects after decoding may use significantly more memory than their serialized version. It is possible to craft a JSON payload to maximize the factor between serialized memory usage and deserialized memory usage, similar to a zip bomb, with factors reaching approximately 35. This can be used to circumvent the max_request_size configuration parameter which is intended to protect against denial of service attacks. The request body is parsed into a map very early in the request handling chain before authentication, which means an unauthenticated attacker can send a specifically crafted JSON object and cause an out-of-memory crash. Additionally, for requests with large numbers of strings, the audit subsystem can consume large quantities of CPU. The vulnerability is fixed in version 2.4.1.
- CVSS 3.1
- 7.5 HIGHCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
- EPSS
- 0.65% probability · 49th percentile
- CISA KEV
- Not listed
- Weakness
- CWE-400
- Affected
- openbao/openbao
- Source
- security-advisories@github.com
References
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/blob/788536bd3e10818a7b4fb00aac6affc23388e5a9/http/logical.go#L50Product
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/commit/d418f238bc99adc72c73109faf574cc2b672880cPatch
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/pull/1756Issue Tracking
- https://github.com/openbao/openbao/security/advisories/GHSA-g46h-2rq9-gw5mVendor Advisory
Source: NVD record, EPSS from FIRST.org, KEV from CISA. Refreshed daily.