CVE-2026-43971: Link Header Directive Smuggling via Unescaped target/rel/Attribute Keys in cow_link:link/1

Severity: medium (CVSS 6.3 v4.0)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.5% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2026-08-18 · updated 2026-10-22
Weakness: CWE-116

Description

Improper Encoding or Escaping of Output vulnerability in ninenines cowlib allows Link header directive smuggling via unescaped special characters in cow_link:link/1. cow_link:do_link/1 in cowlib interpolates the target URI, rel value, and attribute keys directly into the serialized Link: header value without escaping or token-grammar validation. A > byte in target prematurely closes the URI slot, allowing an attacker to append additional link entries with attacker-chosen rel directives. A " or \ in rel escapes the quoted string and opens new parameters. Any byte — including whitespace, =, and " — in an attribute key is emitted verbatim. Because browsers act on Link: directives such as rel="preconnect", rel="preload", and rel="prerender", an attacker who can influence these fields in an application that round-trips parsed Link headers through cow_link:link/1 can force victim browsers to make out-of-band connections to attacker-controlled origins. This issue affects cowlib: from 2.9.0 before 2.20.0.

Affected products

ninenines cowlib: from 2.9.0 before 2.20.0 — fixed in 2.20.0

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: ninenines cowlib 2.20.0. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

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