GitHub Advisoryadvisory · Packagist
GHSA-5739-39v2-5754 PHP JWT Library: RSA1_5 (RSAES-PKCS1-v1_5) decryption lacks implicit rejection, exposing a Bleichenbacher/Marvin padding oracle
MEDIUM
Official page ↗
- Ecosystem
- Packagist
- Packages
- web-token/jwt-library
- Severity
- Moderate
- CVSS vector
- CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:H/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:L/VI:N/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
- Weaknesses
- CWE-208, CWE-385
- Reviewed
- 2026-06-18
Affected packages
• Packagist web-token/jwt-library: < 3.4.10 → fixed in 3.4.10
• Packagist web-token/jwt-library: >= 4.0.0, < 4.0.7 → fixed in 4.0.7
• Packagist web-token/jwt-library: >= 4.1.0, < 4.1.7 → fixed in 4.1.7
Description
Impact
`RSACrypt::decryptWithRSA15()` (used by the `RSA1_5` key-encryption algorithm) implements RSAES-PKCS1-v1_5 decryption by inspecting the padding after RSADP and throwing `InvalidArgumentException` as soon as the padding is malformed. It does not implement the implicit-rejection countermeasure required by RFC 3447 §7.2.2 / RFC 8017 §7.1.2 (return a deterministic pseudo-random value of the expected length on padding failure and let the downstream step fail uniformly).
From a JWE caller this yields a Bleichenbacher/Marvin padding oracle: an attacker submitting adaptively crafted `encrypted_key` values can distinguish (a) padding rejected, (b) padding valid but wrong CEK length, and (c) padding valid and full AEAD executed — even though `JWEDecrypter` returns the same `false` in all cases — because each path performs a measurably different amount of work, amplifiable by enlarging the ciphertext (CWE-208 timing side channel). Enough adaptive queries can recover the wrapped CEK.
Affected configurations
Applications that register `RSA1_5` in their decryption `AlgorithmManager` and hold an RSA private key.
Patches
PKCS#1 v1.5 decryption now performs implicit rejection: on invalid padding (or unexpected recovered length) it returns a random CEK of the expected size selected in constant time, so the full content-decryption (AEAD) step always runs and fails uniformly, removing the observable difference between padding-valid and padding-invalid ciphertexts. Users are still strongly encouraged to migrate to `RSA-OAEP`.
Workarounds
Prefer `RSA-OAEP`/`RSA-OAEP-256`; do not enable `RSA1_5` for untrusted tokens.
References
• RFC 3447 §7.2.2 / RFC 8017 §7.1.2
• Bleichenbacher (1998); Marvin attack
• CWE-208: Observable Timing Discrepancy
Résolution
Un correctif a été préparé sur une branche dédiée basée sur `3.4.x`, avec des tests anti-régression dédiés (fork privé temporaire de cette advisory, PR #1).
RSA1_5 — déchiffrement PKCS#1 v1.5 avec *implicit rejection* en temps constant (RFC 3447 §7.2.2) : un padding invalide n'est plus distinguable d'un padding valide, neutralisant l'oracle Bleichenbacher.
Validation : `php -l` OK, PHPUnit vert, aucune nouvelle erreur PHPStan introduite (différentiel nul vs `3.4.x`), aucun commentaire ajouté dans le code source. Après merge, cascade prévue `3.4.x → 4.0.x → 4.1.x`.