CVE-2026-25506: MUNGE has a buffer overflow in message unpacking allows key leakage and credential forgery

Severity: high (CVSS 7.8 v3.1)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.3% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2026-02-10 · updated 2026-07-15
Weakness: CWE-787

Description

MUNGE is an authentication service for creating and validating user credentials. From 0.5 to 0.5.17, local attacker can exploit a buffer overflow vulnerability in munged (the MUNGE authentication daemon) to leak cryptographic key material from process memory. With the leaked key material, the attacker could forge arbitrary MUNGE credentials to impersonate any user (including root) to services that rely on MUNGE for authentication. The vulnerability allows a buffer overflow by sending a crafted message with an oversized address length field, corrupting munged's internal state and enabling extraction of the MAC subkey used for credential verification. This vulnerability is fixed in 0.5.18.

Affected products

Debian Linux: 11.0
openSUSE Munge: from 0.5 before 0.5.18 — fixed in 0.5.18

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: openSUSE Munge 0.5.18. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

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