Cyber Resilience

CWE · MITRE source

CWE-617Reachable Assertion

Abstraction: Base · CVEs in our corpus: 810

The product contains an assert() or similar statement that can be triggered by an attacker, which leads to an application exit or other behavior that is more severe than necessary.

While assertion is good for catching logic errors and reducing the chances of reaching more serious vulnerability conditions, it can still lead to a denial of service. For example, if a server handles multiple simultaneous connections, and an assert() occurs in one single connection that causes all other connections to be dropped, this is a reachable assertion that leads to a denial of service.

Last updated: 20 August 2026 20:22 UTC

Control responseHuman-reviewed

Answering this weakness across the control lifecycle, from our framework cross-walks.

Prevent
Stop it (NIST 800-53 / CSF Protect)
  • PR.PS-06
  • ID.RA-01
  • SA-11 Developer Testing and Evaluation
  • SI-10 Information Input Validation
Detect
Catch it (CSF Detect / Respond)
  • DE.CM-09
Harden
Shrink the surface (DISA STIG)

Validate
Prove the fix (OWASP ASVS)

NIST 800-53 r5 controls that address this weakness (0)AI-assisted

Control Title Family Why it addresses this CWE
No NIST controls proposed yet.

Top CVEs of this weakness type, ranked by Risk Priority

CVE Risk CVSS EPSS Published
CVE-2020-8617 8.57.50.93422020-05-19
CVE-2006-5779 8.47.50.75892006-11-07
CVE-2020-36222 8.47.50.77742021-01-26
CVE-2021-27212 8.27.50.64152021-02-14
CVE-2018-5740 8.17.50.59622019-01-16
CVE-2016-8864 7.67.50.38732016-11-02
CVE-2019-9795 7.69.80.01702019-04-26
CVE-2018-12543 7.57.50.36012018-11-15
CVE-2020-3615 7.49.80.00752020-06-02
CVE-2024-35884 7.49.80.00682024-05-19
CVE-2022-3488 7.17.50.19192023-01-26
CVE-2023-49286 7.18.60.10352023-12-04
CVE-2020-12417 7.08.80.02692020-07-09
CVE-2022-3924 7.07.50.16112023-01-26
CVE-2023-28425 7.05.50.54982023-03-20
CVE-2017-7478 6.97.50.13892017-05-15
CVE-2006-4095 6.87.50.11762006-09-06
CVE-2011-3596 6.87.50.11052019-11-26
CVE-2020-6617 6.88.80.01142020-01-08
CVE-2020-6619 6.88.80.01142020-01-08
CVE-2020-6623 6.88.80.01452020-01-08
CVE-2020-15670 6.88.80.01082020-10-01
CVE-2020-36230 6.87.50.12292021-01-26
CVE-2021-25215 6.87.50.11392021-04-29
CVE-2026-278096.89.10.00412026-02-26