CVE-2026-45372
Yhirose Cpp-Httplib ≤ 0.44.0
Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:H/A:LSummary
CVE-2026-45372 is a critical-severity CRLF Injection (CWE-93) vulnerability in Yhirose Cpp-Httplib. Its CVSS base score is 9.9 (Critical).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploit Public-Facing Application (T1190); ranked at the 22th 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 SI-10 (Information Input Validation) and SC-7 (Boundary Protection) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)
EU & UK References
No EU or UK CSIRT advisories indexed for this CVE.
Vulnerability Data
cpp-httplib is a C++11 single-file header-only cross platform HTTP/HTTPS library. Prior to 0.44.0, when cpp-httplib's server parses an incoming request, it applies percent-decoding to every header value except Location and Referer. The validity check (is_field_value) is run before decoding, so…
more
encoded %0D%0A passes the check and is then expanded to a literal \r\n byte pair inside the stored header value. This vulnerability is fixed in 0.44.0.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
—
—
—
V4.1.3V4.2.4V1.5.3V4.1.1
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Input validation directly stops untrusted data containing CRLF sequences from reaching the component that treats CRLF as a delimiter.
Boundary protection at external interfaces can enforce consistent HTTP request/response parsing rules between intermediaries and endpoints.
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.
Configuration management can enforce uniform HTTP parsing rules across intermediaries, directly mitigating inconsistent interpretation.
Secure SDLC practices directly require input neutralization and validation to block CRLF injection.
Network monitoring can detect smuggling attempts via anomalous HTTP traffic or logs, while eliminating the inconsistency directly aids detection of such events.
Network protections can enforce consistent HTTP proxy/firewall behavior to block smuggling, and removing the weakness helps prevent unauthorized access via request smuggling.
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.
Security testing can detect CRLF flaws but does not itself implement the neutralization.
Network security controls can enforce consistent HTTP parsing and proxy behavior that mitigates request smuggling.
Secure network services include hardening proxies and gateways against inconsistent HTTP interpretation.
Secure development lifecycle mandates input validation and output encoding that directly prevents CRLF injection.
Application security requirements include rules for neutralizing special characters such as CRLF in inputs.
Secure architecture principles encourage safe handling of untrusted data but do not prescribe specific CRLF controls.