GitHub Advisoryadvisory · Maven
GHSA-x4gw-5cx5-pgmh Netty: SNI handler pre-allocates up to 16 MiB from nine attacker bytes
HIGH
Official page ↗
- Aliases
- CVE-2026-45416
- Ecosystem
- Maven
- Packages
- io.netty:netty-handler
- Severity
- High
- CVSS vector
- CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
- Weaknesses
- CWE-770
- Reviewed
- 2026-06-08
Affected packages
• Maven io.netty:netty-handler: >= 4.2.0.Final, < 4.2.15.Final → fixed in 4.2.15.Final
• Maven io.netty:netty-handler: < 4.1.135.Final → fixed in 4.1.135.Final
Description
SslClientHelloHandler.decode() reads the 24-bit TLS handshake length and, when the ClientHello does not fit in the first record, eagerly allocates `ctx.alloc().buffer(handshakeLength)` (line 161). The guard at line 140 is `handshakeLength > maxClientHelloLength && maxClientHelloLength != 0`, and the commonly-used SniHandler/AbstractSniHandler constructors (SniHandler(Mapping), SniHandler(AsyncMapping), AbstractSniHandler()) pass maxClientHelloLength=0 and handshakeTimeoutMillis=0, so the length guard is disabled and no timeout is scheduled. A 16 MiB request exceeds the default pooled chunk size and becomes a huge/unpooled allocation performed immediately. The buffer is retained in the handler until the channel closes.
Related
Alias · CVE (1)
- CVE-2026-45416 Netty is a network application framework for development of protocol servers and clients. vulnerability
Weakness · CWE (1)
- CWE-770 Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling weakness
References
- https://github.com/netty/netty/security/advisories/GHSA-x4gw-5cx5-pgmh web
- https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-45416 advisory
- https://github.com/netty/netty package
- https://github.com/netty/netty/releases/tag/netty-4.1.135.Final web
- https://github.com/netty/netty/releases/tag/netty-4.2.15.Final web