CVE-2026-42402
Apache Neethi is vulnerable to a Denial of Service attack through algorithmic complexity in policy normalization.
Does this matter?
High impact if exploited, but EPSS currently rates exploitation as unlikely (0.71%). Schedule it in the normal patch cycle and watch for a rise in EPSS or a public exploit.
Description
Apache Neethi is vulnerable to a Denial of Service attack through algorithmic complexity in policy normalization. Specially crafted WS-Policy documents can trigger an exponential Cartesian cross-product expansion during the normalization process, causing unbounded memory allocation that exhausts the JVM heap. This occurs when the normalization process generates an excessive number of policy alternatives without bounds, leading to runtime memory exhaustion. Users should upgrade to 3.2.2 which limits the maximum number of normalized policy alternatives.
- 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
- 0.71% probability · 53th percentile
- Public exploits
- None in Exploit-DB
- CISA KEV
- Not listed
- Weakness
- CWE-400
- Affected
- apache/neethi
- Source
- security@apache.org
EPSS 0.7% since 26 October 2026; no change recorded yet. Points are recorded when the score first appears and whenever it moves by a percentage point or more.
References
- https://lists.apache.org/thread/p826j0phhmr9f83wzpmys1y0bdfrr2q4Mailing List, Vendor Advisory
- http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2026/05/01/6Mailing List, Third Party Advisory
Source: NVD record, EPSS from FIRST.org, KEV from CISA, exploits from Exploit-DB. Refreshed daily. Download this record as JSON.