CVE-2026-55990

In NLnet Labs Unbound 1.7.0 up to and including 1.25.1, when the 'dnscrypt:' clause lists more 'dnscrypt-provider-cert:' files than there are matching 'dnscrypt-secret-key:' files, Unbound fills only the matched prefix and leaves the tail slots at the '0xdb' fill that libsodium's allocator writes into every allocation. Unbound would then iterate over the number of cert files, not the actual slots, so it walks into a slot with garbage data filled with '0xdb' bytes. Any unauthenticated client that sends one UDP datagram of ≥ 68 bytes whose first 8 bytes are '0xdb' to 'dnscrypt-port' will use that garbage entry which leads to a garbage dereference killing the server. This is a silent faulty configuration that goes unnoticed until triggered with the right client query. Unbound needs to be compiled with DNSCrypt support ('--enable-dnscrypt').

CVSS v3 5.9 MEDIUM

5.9^/10

CVSS v3 : MEDIUM

Vector :

Exploitability : 2.2 / Impact : 3.6

Attack Vector NETWORK

Attack Complexity HIGH

Privileges Required NONE

User Interaction NONE

Confidentiality Impact NONE

Integrity Impact NONE

Availability Impact HIGH

Scope UNCHANGED

References

Link	Resource
https://www.nlnetlabs.nl/downloads/unbound/CVE-2026-55990.txt	Vendor Advisory

Configurations

Configuration 1 (hide)

cpe:2.3:a:nlnetlabs:unbound:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

History

No history.

Information

Published : 2026-07-22 14:17

Updated : 2026-07-24 14:24

NVD link : CVE-2026-55990

Mitre link : CVE-2026-55990

CVE.ORG link : CVE-2026-55990

JSON object : View

Products Affected

nlnetlabs

unbound

CWE

CWE-457

Use of Uninitialized Variable

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