CVE-2026-29609
Published: 05 March 2026
Summary
CVE-2026-29609 is a high-severity Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling (CWE-770) vulnerability in Openclaw Openclaw. Its CVSS base score is 7.5 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Application Exhaustion Flood (T1499.003); ranked at the 38.0th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog; a public proof-of-concept is referenced.
Threat & Defense at a Glance
Threat & Defense Details
Likely Mitigating ControlsAI
Per-CVE control mapping for this CVE has not run yet; the list below is derived from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry.
This control implements explicit throttling on session allocation, addressing the weakness of allocating resources without limits.
Plan testing exercises resource allocation limits and throttling during simulated failures, directly addressing weaknesses that allow unbounded resource use.
Contingency plan updates ensure recovery strategies address unbounded resource allocation, making it harder for attackers to exploit lack of throttling to cause prolonged outages.
Provides continuity when unbounded resource allocation at the primary site leads to exhaustion and downtime.
Alternate services allow operations to continue when primary allocation of resources lacks limits or throttling.
Explicit planning of security-related actions requires defining limits, windows, and resource allocations, making allocation without throttling far less likely.
Measures of performance include tracking allocation behavior and throttling effectiveness, reducing the window for resource exhaustion attacks.
Imposes an inactivity-based limit on network resource allocation, throttling the number of concurrently held connections.
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise TechniquesAI
Why these techniques?
The vulnerability directly enables an Application Exhaustion Flood (T1499.003) by allowing remote attackers to trigger unbounded memory allocation through oversized HTTP responses lacking Content-Length headers, resulting in resource exhaustion and denial of service.
NVD Description
OpenClaw versions prior to 2026.2.14 contain a denial of service vulnerability in the fetchWithGuard function that allocates entire response payloads in memory before enforcing maxBytes limits. Remote attackers can trigger memory exhaustion by serving oversized responses without content-length headers to…
more
cause availability loss.
Deeper analysisAI
CVE-2026-29609 is a denial-of-service vulnerability in OpenClaw versions prior to 2026.2.14. The flaw exists in the fetchWithGuard function, which allocates entire response payloads into memory before applying maxBytes limits. This leads to potential memory exhaustion when handling oversized responses, corresponding to CWE-770 (Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling) and carrying a CVSS v3.1 base score of 7.5 (AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H).
Remote, unauthenticated attackers can exploit the vulnerability over the network with low complexity by serving oversized HTTP responses that lack content-length headers. Successful exploitation triggers unbounded memory allocation in the affected component, resulting in resource exhaustion and loss of availability for the OpenClaw application.
The GitHub Security Advisory (GHSA-j27p-hq53-9wgc) and associated patch commit (00a08908892d1743d1fc52e5cbd9499dd5da2fe0) address the issue in OpenClaw 2026.2.14. The VulnCheck advisory confirms that upgrading to this version or later enforces the maxBytes limit prior to full payload allocation, mitigating the denial-of-service risk.
Details
- CWE(s)