Netty

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. In versions 4.2.0.Final through 4.2.15.Final and 4.1.0.Final through 4.1.135.Final, any caller that can deliver bytes to a Netty channel pipeline containing `XmlDecoder` can send XML with a `DOCTYPE` declaration to an `AsyncXMLInputFactory` instantiated with no security configuration, leaving DTD and entity handling active depending on Aalto XML async parser behavior and creating conditional XML external entity risk. This issue is fixed in versions 4.1.136.Final and 4.2.16.Final.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to 4.2.16.Final, Netty's `Http3FrameCodec` buffers incoming data for HTTP/3 reserved frame types up to the wire-specified payload length without limits; `decodeFrame` trusts `payLoadLength`, allowing an attacker to open multiple QUIC streams and send reserved frames with very large payload lengths to cause memory exhaustion and denial of service. This issue is fixed in version 4.2.16.Final.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Versions 4.2.0.Final through 4.2.15.Final and 4.1.0.Final through 4.1.135.Final, are vulnerable to security control bypass during the origin evaluation process. CorsHandler provides a shortCircuit() configuration designed to reject unauthorized cross-origin requests immediately, acting as a security control before requests reach the application. However, due to a logical operator error in the origin evaluation process, this protection can be entirely bypassed. An attacker can bypass the short-circuit mechanism by sending a request with an Origin: null header. This failure forwards unauthorized requests to the backend application, bypassing intended access controls. This issue is fixed in versions 4.1.136.Final and 4.2.16.Final.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. In versions 4.2.0.Final through 4.2.15.Final and 4.1.0.Final through 4.1.135.Final, the `SpdyHttpDecoder` handler in Netty's SPDY-to-HTTP codec allocates a pooled `ByteBuf` when processing a client-initiated `SYN_STREAM` frame with `FLAG_FIN=0` and stores the partially constructed `FullHttpRequest` in `messageMap`; when the remote peer sends `RST_STREAM` for that stream or the accumulated content exceeds `maxContentLength`, the decoder removes the entry but does not release the pooled `ByteBuf`, causing native memory exhaustion. This issue is fixed in versions 4.1.136.Final and 4.2.16.Final.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. In versions 4.2.0.Final up to (but not including) 4.2.16.Final, and 4.1.0.Final up to (but not including) 4.1.135, the `HAProxyMessageDecoder` in Netty's `codec-haproxy` module performs protocol version detection by reading the 13th byte as a signed Java `byte` and widening it to `int` without masking; a PROXY protocol v2 binary prefix followed by version byte `0xFF` sign-extends to `-1`, collides with the decoder's need-more-data sentinel, and causes `ByteToMessageDecoder` to accumulate inbound bytes in an unbounded `cumulation` buffer until direct memory is exhausted. This issue is fixed in versions 4.1.136.Final and 4.2.16.Final.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, Netty HTTP/2 max header size handling produces an attack similar to HTTP/2 Rapid Reset. There is a setting in the http2 specification called `SETTINGS_MAX_HEADER_LIST_SIZE`. When a client sends that setting to Netty, it appears that Netty will behave as follows: read the request; proxy the request to the origin; attempt to produce a response; and create an exception while writing the headers for the response. Functionally, this should be similar to the http2 reset attack, but with a different on-the-wire signature. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, before reading the first request-line, `HttpObjectDecoder` skips every byte for which `Character.isISOControl(b)` is `true` (0x00–0x1F and 0x7F) as well as all whitespace. RFC 9112 §2.2 only asks servers to ignore empty CRLF lines preceding the request-line — a carefully scoped robustness allowance intended to handle HTTP/1.0 POST workarounds. Silently absorbing NUL bytes, SOH, STX, and other non-CRLF control characters goes significantly beyond this, and can be exploited for request-boundary confusion in pipelined or multiplexed transports where a front-end component treats those bytes differently. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, RedisArrayAggregator pre-allocates ArrayList with initial capacity equal to the RESP array element count declared in an array header. That count is taken from the wire before the corresponding child messages exist. A small malicious header can claim a huge initial capacity. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, SimpleTrustManagerFactory.engineGetTrustManagers() and related paths wrap any user-supplied plain X509TrustManager in X509TrustManagerWrapper, which extends X509ExtendedTrustManager but implements the 3-arg checkServerTrusted(chain, authType, SSLEngine) by discarding the SSLEngine and calling the 2-arg delegate. Because the object now IS an X509ExtendedTrustManager, neither SunJSSE's internal AbstractTrustManagerWrapper nor Netty's own OpenSslX509TrustManagerWrapper will re-wrap it to add endpoint-identification. Consequently, even though Netty 4.2 sets endpointIdentificationAlgorithm="HTTPS" by default, a client built with `SslContextBuilder.forClient().trustManager(somePlainX509TrustManager)` performs no hostname verification at all. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to version 4.2.15.Final, Netty QUIC exposes the stateless reset token on the network path when using the default HMAC-based connection-ID and stateless-reset-token generators. The reset token for the server's current source connection ID can be derived from bytes that appear as the connection ID in QUIC headers after a source-CID rotation. An on-path attacker observing the headers can use the token to perform a Denial of Service by sending a spoofed Stateless Reset packet. Version 4.2.15.Final patches the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Starting in version 4.2.0.Final and prior to version 4.2.15.Final, a memory exhaustion vulnerability in the Netty HTTP/3 codec allows the creation of an infinite number of blocked streams, which can cause OOM error. Version 4.2.15.Final patches the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, the HAProxy PROXY protocol v2 codec in netty leaks native or heap memory on every connection when a client sends a syntactically valid header containing nested `PP2_TYPE_SSL` TLVs (type-length-value records) at depth two or greater. The leak occurs on the successful parse path — no exception is thrown, the message fires downstream, the decoder removes itself, and the application releases the `HAProxyMessage` normally. Yet the underlying cumulation buffer (a pooled, potentially direct `ByteBuf` allocated by the channel) remains permanently pinned. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. In netty-codec-http2 prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, the `DelegatingDecompressorFrameListener` class orchestrates HTTP/2 decompression by embedding a per-stream `EmbeddedChannel` that runs the appropriate decompression codec (gzip, deflate, zstd) and forwards decompressed chunks to a wrapped listener. Each decompressed chunk is a pooled `ByteBuf` handed to an anonymous `ChannelInboundHandlerAdapter` tail handler, which becomes the sole owner responsible for releasing it. A remote peer could send frames that would result in the flow-controller throwing and so trigger a resource leak which at the end might take down the whole JVM due OOME. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, the RedisArrayAggregator handler permanently leaks pooled direct-memory buffers when a Redis pipeline connection closes before a RESP array aggregate completes. The handler retains child messages in per-handler state (`depths` field) but defines no `channelInactive`, `handlerRemoved`, or `exceptionCaught` method to release them when the pipeline tears down. Because the leaked buffers are slices of `PooledByteBufAllocator` chunks, they prevent those chunks from being returned to the JVM-wide direct-memory pool. Repeated connection churn by any network peer monotonically drains this shared pool, eventually causing allocation failures on all Netty channels in the process. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, Netty's `DnsResolveContext` insufficiently validates the bailiwick of NS records, enabling DNS Cache Poisoning. An attacker controlling an authoritative name server for a subdomain can poison the cache for parent domains (like `.co.uk`). In `io.netty.resolver.dns.DnsResolveContext.AuthoritativeNameServerList#add` method accepts any NS record from the AUTHORITY section as long as the record's name is a suffix of the questionName. Subsequently, the `handleWithAdditional` method caches the associated A records from the ADDITIONAL section directly into the `authoritativeDnsServerCache` under the parent domain's key. This bypasses standard bailiwick rules, where a server authoritative for a subdomain should not be trusted to provide authoritative records for its parent. The poisoned cache is then used for all future resolutions under the parent domain's key. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, DefaultHttp2Connection.DefaultEndpoint initialises maxActiveStreams/maxStreams to Integer.MAX_VALUE, and Http2Settings never inserts SETTINGS_MAX_CONCURRENT_STREAMS by default (Http2Settings.java:305-307 only clamps a user-supplied value). Unless the application explicitly calls initialSettings().maxConcurrentStreams(n), a Netty HTTP/2 server advertises no limit and enforces none locally. Each open stream allocates a DefaultStream object, PropertyMap slots, flow-controller state and IntObjectHashMap entry; with ~2^30 permissible odd stream IDs a single TCP connection can create hundreds of thousands of long-lived stream objects. This is also the precondition for CVE-2023-44487-style Rapid-Reset amplification, where the absence of a low concurrent cap multiplies backend work. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. In versions of netty-transport-sctp prior to 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, for each non-complete SctpMessage fragment the handler does `fragments.put(streamId, Unpooled.wrappedBuffer(frag, byteBuf))`, wrapping the previous accumulator and the new slice into a *new* CompositeByteBuf every time. After N fragments the accumulator is an N-deep chain of composites, each holding references and component arrays; readableBytes()/getBytes() on the final buffer recurse N levels. There is no limit on N, on total bytes, or on the number of streamIdentifiers an attacker can open (each gets its own map entry). A peer that never sets the `complete` flag can grow this structure indefinitely from tiny 1-byte DATA chunks. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, Netty's DnsResolveContext fails to validate the origin (bailiwick) of CNAME records in DNS responses. Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, Netty's DNS resolver uses a predictable PRNG for generating DNS transaction IDs and defaults to a static UDP source port. This combination reduces the entropy of DNS queries, enabling DNS Cache Poisoning (Kaminsky attack). Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less

Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. Prior to versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final, netty_unix_socket_recvFd sets msg_control to `char control[CMSG_SPACE(sizeof(int))]` (line 940) — 24 bytes on 64-bit Linux. A peer-sent SCM_RIGHTS cmsg carrying two ints has cmsg_len = CMSG_LEN(8) = 24, which fits exactly with no MSG_CTRUNC, so the kernel installs both fds in the receiving process. The subsequent check `cmsg->cmsg_len == CMSG_LEN(sizeof(int))` (line 972, expected 20) fails, the branch that would read the fd is skipped, and neither installed fd is closed. The for(;;) loop calls recvmsg again (non-blocking → EAGAIN → Java maps to 0 → read loop exits normally), leaving two leaked fds per message. There is no MSG_CTRUNC handling. Reachable via Epoll/KQueue DomainSocketChannel when the application opts into DomainSocketReadMode.FILE_DESCRIPTORS (non-default). Versions 4.1.135.Final and 4.2.15.Final patch the issue.Show less