Critical CVSS 9.8
CVE-2026-74901
NVD analysis in progress
openssl_encrypt versions before 1.4.0 contain an authentication bypass vulnerability in pqc.py where AES-GCM decryption failures trigger fallback to unauthenticated AES-CTR mode. Attackers can modify ciphertext in transit to bypass integrity verification and perform bit-flipping attacks without detection.
What this means
- Exposure
- Exploitable remotely over the network, without authentication and with no action from the victim.
- Impact
- An attacker can read sensitive data, modify or destroy data and take the service offline.
- Weakness
- A cryptographic signature is not properly verified, so forged content passes as authentic.
- Likelihood
- Its EPSS score stays low: nothing points to imminent exploitation, which is no reason to leave it unpatched.
What to doPatch without waiting for the next scheduled cycle. Start with the instances exposed to the internet.
Read automatically from the CVSS vector, the weakness type (CWE) and the EPSS score. The technical description above remains the one published by NIST.