Cyber Resilience

CVE-2026-39396

DoS in Openbao ≤ 2.5.3

Public PoCDoS
Published
21 April 2026
Modified
01 May 2026
Patch / advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 3.1
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L
EPSS Score 0.0022 12th percentile
Risk Priority 27 floored blend · peak EPSS

Summary

CVE-2026-39396 is a low-severity Uncontrolled Resource Consumption (CWE-400) vulnerability in Openbao Openbao. Its CVSS base score is 3.1 (Low).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Network Denial of Service (T1498); ranked at the 12th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog; a public proof-of-concept is referenced.

The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to AC-10 (Concurrent Session Control) and SC-5 (Denial-of-service Protection) — see the control section below for these in your framework.

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

OpenBao is an open source identity-based secrets management system. Prior to version 2.5.3, `ExtractPluginFromImage()` in OpenBao's OCI plugin downloader extracts a plugin binary from a container image by streaming decompressed tar data via `io.Copy` with no upper bound on the…

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number of bytes written. An attacker who controls or compromises the OCI registry referenced in the victim's configuration can serve a crafted image containing a decompression bomb that decompresses to an arbitrarily large file. The SHA256 integrity check occurs after the full file is written to disk, meaning the hash mismatch is detected only after the damage (disk exhaustion) has already occurred. This allow the attacker to replace **legit plugin image** with no need to change its signature. Version 2.5.3 contains a patch.

CWE(s)

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1498 Network Denial of Service Impact
Adversaries may perform Network Denial of Service (DoS) attacks to degrade or block the availability of targeted resources to users.
T1499 Endpoint Denial of Service Impact
Adversaries may perform Endpoint Denial of Service (DoS) attacks to degrade or block the availability of services to users.
T1499.001 OS Exhaustion Flood Impact
Adversaries may launch a denial of service (DoS) attack targeting an endpoint's operating system (OS).
T1499.003 Application Exhaustion Flood Impact
Adversaries may target resource intensive features of applications to cause a denial of service (DoS), denying availability to those applications.
T1498.001 Direct Network Flood Impact
Adversaries may attempt to cause a denial of service (DoS) by directly sending a high-volume of network traffic to a target.
T1498.002 Reflection Amplification Impact
Adversaries may attempt to cause a denial of service (DoS) by reflecting a high-volume of network traffic to a target.
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2025-59043Same product: Openbao Openbao
CVE-2026-39388Same product: Openbao Openbao
CVE-2025-64761Same product: Openbao Openbao
CVE-2025-62705Same product: Openbao Openbao
CVE-2025-54997Same product: Openbao Openbao
CVE-2025-52893Same product: Openbao Openbao
CVE-2025-55000Same product: Openbao Openbao
CVE-2026-42186Same product: Openbao Openbao
CVE-2025-55003Same product: Openbao Openbao
CVE-2025-55001Same product: Openbao Openbao

Affected Assets

openbao
openbao
≤ 2.5.3

Mitigating Controls

Control response

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53)

Detect
Catch it (NIST detect / respond)

Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)
  • 5 hardening rules · 3 OS baselines
Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)
  • V15.4.4

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

Directly enforces a hard limit on concurrent sessions, structurally preventing unbounded resource allocation.

SC-5 directly limits the effects of resource-exhaustion events that constitute uncontrolled consumption.

SC-6 enforces explicit allocation limits on resources, structurally preventing the weakness from occurring.

Input validation can reject or constrain data that would otherwise drive unbounded recursive calls.

Imposes a limit on consecutive invalid attempts, preventing one specific class of unbounded resource consumption.

Process isolation confines resource consumption to separate domains, reducing blast radius without stopping the root flaw.

Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

PR.IR-04 mostly match
prevents

Explicitly requires monitoring and maintaining resource capacity, directly addressing uncontrolled consumption to preserve availability.

PR.PS-06 mostly match
prevents

Secure SDLC practices directly prevent coding errors such as missing recursion limits or termination conditions.

DE.CM-09 partial match
prevents

Continuous monitoring of computing resources can detect resource exhaustion but does not itself enforce allocation limits.

ID.RA-01 partial match
prevents

Vulnerability identification processes can discover and record uncontrolled recursion flaws before deployment.

PR.IR-03 partial match
prevents

Resilience mechanisms such as avoiding single points of failure indirectly reduce impact of resource exhaustion.

PR.PS-01 partial match
prevents

Hardened configuration baselines can include resource quotas and limits that constrain consumption.

Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

finds

Resource-utilization monitoring and alerting on bottlenecks or overloads limits the impact of denial-of-service or resource-exhaustion attacks.

finds

Security testing in development can detect excessive recursion via static analysis or fuzzing.

prevents

By continuously monitoring utilization, stress-testing peak loads, and maintaining documented plans to scale or throttle resources, the control directly limits an attacker’s ability to drive a system into uncontrolled resource exhaustion.

finds

Pre-agreed severity-based prioritization and resource allocation during incident triage reduce the likelihood that an attacker-induced resource exhaustion will overwhelm the organization before corrective action is taken.

mitigates

Business-continuity plans that include resource-management controls reduce the likelihood that an attacker can trigger uncontrolled resource consumption by forcing the system into a degraded or fallback state.

mitigates

Defining RTOs and capacity requirements for ICT services during business-impact analysis forces organizations to provision sufficient resources and throttling mechanisms, reducing the likelihood that an attacker can induce denial-of-service through uncontrolled resource consumption.

Hardening callouts derived

Configuration rules from DISA STIG baselines that bear on weaknesses of the type cited by this CVE. Each rule is shown with the relationship its mapping actually records, against the CWE it was authored against. Derived via CVE→CWE over `controls_xwalks` (authoritative rows only; rows rated `none` are excluded).

Oracle Linux 8 (2 rules)
  • V-248552 OL 8 must be configured so that all network connections associated with SSH traffic terminate after becoming unresponsive. prevents CWE-770
  • V-248553 OL 8 must be configured so that all network connections associated with SSH traffic are terminated after 10 minutes of becoming unresponsive. prevents CWE-770
Oracle Linux 9 (2 rules)
  • V-271710 OL 9 must be configured so that all network connections associated with SSH traffic are terminated after 10 minutes of becoming unresponsive. prevents CWE-770
  • V-271709 OL 9 must be configured so that all network connections associated with SSH traffic terminate after becoming unresponsive. prevents CWE-770
RHEL 8 (1 rule)
  • V-230244 RHEL 8 must be configured so that all network connections associated with SSH traffic terminate after becoming unresponsive. prevents CWE-770

References