The Erlang/OTP httpc HTTP client does not enforce a limit on the total size of response headers received from a server.
CVE-2026-55951
The Erlang/OTP httpc HTTP client does not enforce a limit on the total size of response headers received from a server. The maxheadersize option defaults to nolimit, and httpcresponse:parseheaders/6 accumulates every header into a list before the length check runs (which only fires after the terminating CRLF CRLF is received). A malicious or compromised HTTP server can send an arbitrarily large number of headers, or headers with very large values, causing the client process to allocate unbounded memory until the system runs out of memory or the BEAM VM crashes. A proof-of-concept server sending 100,000 headers of roughly 4000 bytes each caused the client VM to allocate over 13 GB of memory in under 30 seconds. Any application using httpc:request/4,5 to connect to untrusted servers is affected. No authentication is required: any server the client connects to (including via a redirect or man-in-the-middle) can trigger the exhaustion. This issue affects OTP from OTP 17.0 before OTP 27.3.4.17, OTP 28.5.0.6, and OTP 29.0.6, corresponding to inets from 5.10 before 9.3.2.7, 9.6.2.3, and 9.7.2. Whether OTP before OTP 17.0, corresponding to inets before 5.10, is affected is unknown.
Assessment
- CVSS
- 8.2 (v4.0)
- Severity
- High
- EPSS
- 0.69% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days
- Known exploited
- Not listed in CISA KEV
- Exploit availability
- Nothing found in Exploit-DB, Metasploit, Nuclei or public PoC repositories
- Published
- 1 September 2026
- Last updated
- 11 November 2026
- Assigner
- EEF
CVSS vectorCVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
At the source
References
- https://github.com/erlang/otp/security/advisories/GHSA-f9fw-mg7q-4g3x
- https://cna.erlef.org/cves/CVE-2026-55951.html
- https://osv.dev/vulnerability/EEF-CVE-2026-55951
- https://www.erlang.org/doc/system/versions.html#order-of-versions
- https://github.com/erlang/otp/commit/aba0fe8c2d700bf4ac94607cf7f00e53bbe4042d
- https://github.com/erlang/otp/commit/e3be1cfe9f6cedd0cd20d9905e05601dfb31c8aa
Community proofs of concept
No community proof of concept yet. If you have one for a published vulnerability and the right to share it, add it below — it will appear here once reviewed.
Submit a proof of concept
Only for publicly disclosed vulnerabilities, and only material from testing you were authorised to perform. This platform does not buy, sell, or broker exploits — see earning from vulnerability research for legitimate bounty programs. Submissions are reviewed before they appear. Text only; do not include live credentials, personal data, or anything targeting systems you are not permitted to test.
Query this programmatically
Agents can read this through the MCP endpoint, or over HTTP:
curl https://cve.zerocrew.in/api/cve/CVE-2026-55951