Suricata EUVD-2026-18241

Remote unauthenticated attacker sending specially crafted network traffic to Suricata 7.0.0-7.0.14 or 8.0.0-8.0.3 running in IDS mode. No victim interaction or special configuration required; default IDS deployments are vulnerable.

Real-world risk is MODERATE-HIGH with operational security implications. The CVSS 7.5 reflects accurate severity: network-accessible (AV:N), no authentication required (PR:N), low complexity (AC:L), and high availability impact (A:H). While not data-destructive, the availability impact is severe in context-degraded IDS performance creates detection gaps that attackers can exploit for lateral movement or data exfiltration. No confirmed active exploitation (no KEV listing) and no public exploit identified at time of analysis, reducing immediate urgency. However, the low attack complexity means adversaries with knowledge of Suricata deployments could easily weaponize crafted traffic patterns. Priority depends on deployment mode: CRITICAL for production IDS/IPS protecting sensitive networks where performance degradation equals security failure; MODERATE for test environments. The attack is automatable once traffic patterns are identified, and technical impact (creating monitoring blind spots) enables subsequent attacks.

An external attacker identifies a target organization running vulnerable Suricata IDS monitoring critical network segments. The attacker crafts network traffic containing specific packet characteristics that trigger inefficient processing algorithms in Suricata's detection engine, causing CPU exhaustion and detection throughput degradation. With the IDS performance severely impacted and unable to process traffic in real-time, the attacker proceeds with secondary attacks (malware delivery, lateral movement, data exfiltration) knowing detection capabilities are compromised. The low attack complexity (AC:L) and no authentication requirement (PR:N) mean attackers can execute this remotely via normal network access without credentials or user interaction.