Attack ChainAIDerived
Hypothetical attack flow derived from CVE metadata – not a confirmed exploit chain
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AccessControl or compromise an RPKI publication point
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DeliveryServe crafted RRDP notification file to validator
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ExploitDelta gaps accepted or excessive delta entries parsed
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ExecutionMemory exhausted or repository data silently skipped
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ImpactValidator denial-of-service or missing RPKI validation data
Vulnerability Assessment
| Weakness |
CWE
OWASP Top 10:2025
A10:2025 - Mishandling of Exceptional Conditions
ASVS 5.0
V16 - Security Logging and Error Handling Exception handling procedures
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| Exploitation Conditions | Exploitation requires Routinator to fetch an RRDP notification file whose contents the attacker controls - i.e. a malicious or compromised RPKI publication point within the trust hierarchy, or a man-in-the-middle on the RRDP transport - rather than any crafted request to an exposed Routinator port. Two concrete triggers from the description: (1) a notification file whose delta entries contain gaps, which Routinator accepts and parses instead of rejecting, yielding incomplete/missing data (integrity); (2) a notification file declaring too many delta entries, causing memory exhaustion and crash (availability). Limiting factors: the attacker must be able to serve crafted RRDP content to the validator, so the realistic threat actor is a rogue/compromised CA or repository operator, or a network-path attacker - not an arbitrary remote host. |
| Impact | Signals are moderate and internally consistent rather than alarming. The CVSS 3.1 vector (AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:H, 8.2) is driven almost entirely by A:H (memory exhaustion / crash of the validator) plus I:L (silently accepting delta gaps, causing missing data); there is no confidentiality impact (C:N). The vendor-assigned priority is 'this_week', not act_now or emergency. No EPSS score, no CISA KEV listing, and no public PoC reference were supplied, so exploitation pressure appears low. The important caveat the raw CVSS hides: although PR:N/AV:N suggest trivial remote reach, exploitation is not against arbitrary internet-exposed Routinator instances - it requires the attacker to control the RRDP content Routinator fetches (a malicious or compromised RPKI publication point, or a MITM on that fetch), which is a meaningful real-world limiter. The 'Information Disclosure' tag conflicts with C:N and appears mislabeled; this is an integrity/availability issue, not disclosure. Net: a genuine availability (DoS) and data-correctness concern for RPKI validation operators, worth patching on a normal cycle, but not an actively-exploited emergency. |
| Exploit ScenarioDerived | A malicious or compromised RPKI publication point (any delegated CA can operate one), or an attacker positioned to tamper with an RRDP fetch, serves Routinator a crafted notification file. In one variant the delta list contains gaps that Routinator accepts and parses anyway, causing it to work from incomplete repository data; in another the file declares an excessive number of delta entries, driving Routinator to exhaust memory and crash. No public exploit identified at time of analysis. |
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Alert meAnalysisAIv1 – Oct 26, 2026
Routinator, NLnet Labs' RPKI relying party validator, mishandles RRDP notification files by accepting delta entries with gaps and by not safely handling an excessive number of delta entries. A malicious or compromised RPKI publication point, or a network-path attacker able to serve crafted RRDP content, can cause incomplete RPKI data (integrity impact) or memory exhaustion and a crash (availability impact). No public exploit code or confirmed active exploitation is identified in the supplied data.
RemediationAI
Consult and apply the Routinator update identified in the NLnet Labs advisory at https://www.nlnetlabs.nl/downloads/routinator/CVE-2026-72753.txt; the supplied data does not state an exact fixed version, so verify the patched release in that advisory before upgrading. Because exploitation requires Routinator to fetch attacker-controlled RRDP content, operators who cannot update immediately should restrict RRDP retrieval to trusted publication points and monitor for abnormal memory use or crashes during repository updates; these measures reduce exposure but do not correct the parsing and resource-handling flaws. No vendor workaround or exact patched version is provided in the available data.
Affected VersionsENISA
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Technical ContextAI · show details
Routinator retrieves RPKI repository data via RRDP, in which a notification file lists snapshot and delta resources. The flaw is an improper handling of exceptional conditions (CWE-755): Routinator accepts and parses notification files containing gaps in the delta sequence instead of rejecting them, and it does not safely handle an excessive number of delta entries. The first case can yield missing repository data; the second can cause memory exhaustion. The CVSS vector is AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:H, reflecting unauthenticated network-triggerable integrity and availability impact while confidentiality is unaffected. The CPE wildcard cpe:2.3:a:nlnet_labs:routinator:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* does not identify a narrower version range in the supplied data.
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Severity by source
AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:H
Validator fetches and parses attacker-controlled RRDP content over the network with no auth to the repository (AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N); no confidentiality (C:N), missing-data integrity impact (I:L), and memory-exhaustion crash (A:H).
Primary rating from Vendor (NLnet Labs).
CVSS VectorVendor: NLnet Labs
DescriptionCVE.org
When Routinator encounters an RRDP notification file with gaps in the delta entries, it is still accepted and parsed, potentially leading to missing data. If it encounters too many delta entries it may run out of memory.
Executive ViewAI
Routinator, NLnet Labs' RPKI validator used to secure BGP routing, has a high-severity flaw (CVE-2026-72753) that could allow a malicious RPKI publication point or network attacker to cause incomplete validation data or crash the service. This impacts the integrity and availability of route origin validation, potentially leading to routing outages or weakened routing security. Leadership should prioritize mitigation because no vendor patch is currently available and the vulnerability affects a critical component of internet routing infrastructure.
No vendor-released patch identified at time of analysis. Interim mitigations: disable RRDP and rely on rsync-only data retrieval; restrict network access to Routinator instances; monitor for abnormal memory usage or crashes; and apply network segmentation and filtering to limit exposure to malicious publication points.
Threat Intelligence Overview
How this decision was reached
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SSVC AssessmentENISA
Priority Score
More in Routinator
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Path traversal in NLnet Labs Routinator allows remote attackers to escape the rsync cache directory by supplying rsync U
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Routinator, NLnet Labs' RPKI relying-party validator, can be driven into memory exhaustion by an AS range in RPKI data w
Routinator exits when it encounters an RRDP-delivered rsync URI whose path cannot be stored on disk, producing a denial
Routinator, NLnet Labs' RPKI relying-party validator, can be hung or terminated by a CRL fetched from the repository hie
Due to a mistake in error checking, Routinator will terminate when an incoming RTR connection is reset by the peer too q
NLnet Labs' Routinator up to and including version 0.12.1 may crash when trying to parse certain malformed RPKI objects.
In NLnet Labs Routinator 0.9.0 up to and including 0.11.2, due to a mistake in error handling, data in RRDP snapshot and
NLnet Labs Routinator versions 0.9.0 up to and including 0.10.1, support the gzip transfer encoding when querying RRDP r
EUVD-2026-110026
GHSA-c2qh-jpwf-6jvx
NVD
CVE.org
EPSS
Vulnrichment
Exploit-DB