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Attack ChainAIDerived

Hypothetical attack flow derived from CVE metadata – not a confirmed exploit chain

  1. Access
    Obtain valid RPCSEC_GSS credentials
  2. Delivery
    Reach RPC service with integrity/privacy enabled
  3. Exploit
    Send oversized wrapped-data request
  4. Execution
    Trigger unbounded memory allocation
  5. Impact
    Exhaust resources and crash service

Vulnerability Assessment

Weakness
CWE
OWASP Top 10:2025
A06:2025 - Insecure Design
ASVS 5.0
V2 - Validation and Business Logic Resource allocation limits
MITRE ATT&CK

1 technique across 1 tactic: Impact

The technique list with ATT&CK links and the kill-chain view is part of the Basic plan and up.

Exploitation Conditions

Exploitation requires the target RPC service to be explicitly configured with RPCSEC_GSS using the integrity (rpc_gss_svc_integrity) or privacy (rpc_gss_svc_privacy) protection level - a non-default, Kerberos-backed mode most common on NFS deployments; services without RPCSEC_GSS or using only authentication-level GSS are not affected. The attacker must be an authenticated RPC client (CVSS PR:L), which limits exploitation to parties able to establish a valid GSS security context. No user interaction is required (UI:N) and the attack is network-reachable (AV:N) with low complexity (AC:L). The impact is limited to availability (service crash/resource exhaustion); there is no confidentiality or integrity effect.

Impact

This is a medium-severity, availability-only Denial of Service with signals that consistently point to a limited real-world priority rather than an urgent threat. The CVSS 3.1 vector (AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H, score 6.5) indicates network reachability and low complexity but requires at least low-level privileges (PR:L), meaning the attacker must already be an authenticated RPC client; there is no confidentiality or integrity impact. No EPSS score, CISA KEV listing, or public POC was provided in the input, so exploitation status is 'no public exploit identified at time of analysis.' No SSVC decision data was supplied. The signals do not conflict: a config-dependent, authenticated, availability-only flaw with no exploitation evidence is a patch-in-normal-cycle issue, not a drop-everything priority. One caveat worth verifying: the description says 'authenticated remote attacker,' and the CVSS PR:L reflects that, but RPCSEC_GSS authentication is Kerberos-based - confirm whether an attacker needs valid credentials or merely a GSS context, as this materially affects exposure.

Exploit ScenarioDerived

An attacker who already holds valid RPCSEC_GSS (Kerberos) credentials to a libtirpc-backed RPC service configured for integrity or privacy protection sends a request containing an oversized wrapped-data length field. The server attempts an unbounded memory allocation to accommodate it, exhausting system resources until the service becomes unstable or terminates. No public exploit code was identified in the provided data; exploitation is low-complexity (AC:L) but gated by authentication.

This Month Plan within 30 days. Why: MEDIUM severity (CVSS 4.0-6.9).
No patch listed yet 0.3% exploitation probability (EPSS)

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AnalysisAIv1 – Oct 16, 2026

Denial of service in libtirpc allows an authenticated remote RPC client to exhaust server memory by sending oversized wrapped-data requests to an RPC service that is configured with RPCSEC_GSS integrity (rpc_gss_svc_integrity) or privacy (rpc_gss_svc_privacy) protection. Only services explicitly running in that non-default, Kerberos-backed mode are exposed - most commonly NFS deployments on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 through 10, Red Hat Hardened Images, and Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4 - and the impact is availability-only (CVSS 6.5, A:H) with no confidentiality or integrity effect. No public exploit code was identified at time of analysis and the issue is not confirmed actively exploited (no CISA KEV listing), so it warrants medium-priority patch tracking rather than emergency response, although affected RPC services can become unstable or terminate under the resource exhaustion.

RemediationAI

No vendor-released patch was identified at time of analysis, so remediation starts with tracking the Red Hat errata published against https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-85231 and https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2478512 and applying the fixed libtirpc package for each affected stream (RHEL 6 through 10, plus rebuilt Hardened Images and OpenShift Container Platform 4 base images once updated) as soon as it is available. Until then, the most direct compensating control is to stop using the affected service levels: reconfigure RPC/NFS exports to rpc_gss_svc_none (Kerberos authentication only) or to a non-GSS flavor such as AUTH_SYS/sys, which avoids the vulnerable wrapped-data parsing path entirely - the trade-off is loss of per-packet integrity and privacy guarantees, so pair it with IPsec, NFS-over-TLS, or strict network isolation of the RPC/NFS segment rather than leaving traffic unprotected. If integrity or privacy service levels are mandatory, restrict reachability of rpcbind and the NFS/RPC ports (e.g., 111/2049 and the portmapper-assigned ports) to trusted client subnets with host firewalls or network policy, accepting that any client holding a valid GSS credential can still trigger the flaw, and cap the blast radius by running the RPC daemons under systemd/cgroup memory limits (MemoryMax/MemoryHigh) or container memory limits so an oversized allocation burst restarts the unit instead of destabilizing the host - with the trade-off that a legitimate large workload may be killed too, so set thresholds from observed peak usage. Finally, monitor GSS-wrapped RPC request sizes and daemon memory growth, and restart or rate-limit pathological clients as a detection-and-containment measure rather than a fix.

Affects your stack

Find out whether the stacks and servers you run are on an affected version.

Checking this CVE against your own stacks and servers is part of the Basic plan and up.

Technical ContextAI · show details

libtirpc is the standalone, glibc-independent implementation of Sun/TI-RPC used by NFS and other ONC RPC services on modern Linux distributions. RPCSEC_GSS (RFC 2203) is a GSS-API-based RPC security flavor in which call arguments and results are wrapped in a GSS token carrying a MIC (rpc_gss_svc_integrity) or full encryption (rpc_gss_svc_privacy); the server must first unwrap and verify each request, which requires allocating buffers sized according to attacker-supplied length fields in the wrapped-data envelope. The root cause is CWE-770 (Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling): libtirpc does not bound the size of the buffer it allocates when parsing an oversized wrapped-data request, so a client that has already established a valid GSS security context can repeatedly force large allocations until memory is exhausted. The CPE data ties the affected code to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10, Red Hat Hardened Images, and Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4, meaning the vulnerable library ships into the base OS and container image layers that back both bare-metal and containerized RPC/NFS workloads. Services that do not enable RPCSEC_GSS, or that use only authentication-level GSS (rpc_gss_svc_none), do not invoke the vulnerable wrapping path and are not affected.

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  • Exploit and PoC references, threat intelligence from 22 sources

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Severity by source

Vendor (redhat) PRIMARY 6.5 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
vuln.today AI 6.5 MEDIUM

Network-reachable with low complexity but requires an authenticated GSS client (PR:L); impact is availability-only resource exhaustion, so C:N/I:N/A:H and scope unchanged.

3.1 AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
4.0 AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
Red Hat 6.5 MEDIUM

Primary rating from Vendor (redhat).

CVSS VectorVendor: redhat

Attack Vector
Network
Attack Complexity
Low
Privileges Required
Low
User Interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High

DescriptionCVE.org

A flaw was found in libtirpc. An authenticated remote attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending oversized wrapped data requests to an RPC (Remote Procedure Call) service configured with RPCSEC_GSS (Remote Procedure Call Security-Generic Security Service) integrity or privacy. This can lead to unbounded memory allocation, resulting in a Denial of Service (DoS) by exhausting system resources and causing the service to become unstable or terminate.

Threat Intelligence Overview

EPSS Score
0.3%
Top 79% exploitable
Prevalence
High
libtirpc is a core RPC library shipped across major Linux distributions and NFS stacks
Social Media
1
Sightings
Data Quality
4 sources
Confidence: Medium

How this decision was reached

The engine reads each signal below and applies a fixed list of rules from top to bottom. The first rule that matches sets the recommended action – like a statement, every line is shown.

SignalValue
Severity MEDIUM
CISA KEV No
Public POC No
EPSS 0.3%
Patch available No
Active threat No
Deciding rule
MEDIUM severity (CVSS 4.0-6.9)
What every action level means
Emergency Immediate action required. Criteria: CRITICAL + in CISA KEV (actively exploited) without patch, OR CRITICAL + EPSS > 30% without patch, OR CRITICAL + active threat signals without patch.
Act Now Prioritize within 24-48h. Criteria: in KEV with patch available, OR CRITICAL + public POC, OR HIGH + EPSS > 10%, OR CRITICAL + active threat, OR any CRITICAL severity.
This Week Schedule remediation this week. Criteria: HIGH severity (CVSS 7.0-8.9). Patch within normal change window.
This Month Plan within 30 days. Criteria: MEDIUM severity (CVSS 4.0-6.9), lower exploitation probability. Include in regular patch cycle.
Monitor Track and reassess. Criteria: LOW severity (CVSS 0.1-3.9), minimal exploitation risk. No immediate action needed.

SSVC AssessmentENISA

SSVC Decision· derived
Scheduled
Exploitation
None
System Exposure· derived
Open
Automatable
No
Human Impact· derived
High
Technical Impact
Partial

Priority Score

32
Low Medium High Critical
KEV: 0
EPSS: 0
CVSS: +32
PoC: 0
Weaponized: 0
Threat intel: 0
Gov advisory: 0

Attack Technique

Denial of Service attacks render applications or systems unavailable by overwhelming resources or triggering failure conditions.

Affected Products (CPE)CVE.org

cpe:2.3:a:red_hat:red_hat_enterprise_linux_10:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:a:red_hat:red_hat_enterprise_linux_6:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:a:red_hat:red_hat_enterprise_linux_7:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:a:red_hat:red_hat_enterprise_linux_8:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:a:red_hat:red_hat_enterprise_linux_9:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:a:red_hat:red_hat_hardened_images:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:a:red_hat:red_hat_openshift_container_platform_4:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:a:red_hat:red_hat_openshift_container_platform_4:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
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Vendor StatusVendor

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