CVE-2026-42587 PUBLISHED

Netty: HttpContentDecompressor maxAllocation bypass via Content-Encoding: br/zstd/snappy enables decompression bomb DoS

Assigner: GitHub_M
Reserved: 28.04.2026 Published: 13.05.2026 Updated: 13.05.2026

Netty is an asynchronous, event-driven network application framework. Prior to 4.2.13.Final and 4.1.133.Final, HttpContentDecompressor accepts a maxAllocation parameter to limit decompression buffer size and prevent decompression bomb attacks. This limit is correctly enforced for gzip and deflate encodings via ZlibDecoder, but is silently ignored when the content encoding is br (Brotli), zstd, or snappy. An attacker can bypass the configured decompression limit by sending a compressed payload with Content-Encoding: br instead of Content-Encoding: gzip, causing unbounded memory allocation and out-of-memory denial of service. The same vulnerability exists in DelegatingDecompressorFrameListener for HTTP/2 connections. This vulnerability is fixed in 4.2.13.Final and 4.1.133.Final.

Metrics

CVSS Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
CVSS Score: 7.5

Product Status

Vendor netty
Product netty
Versions
  • Version >= 4.2.0.Alpha1, < 4.2.13.Final is affected
  • Version < 4.1.133.Final is affected
Vendor io.netty
Product netty-codec-http
Versions
  • Version >= 4.2.0.Alpha1, < 4.2.13.Final is affected
  • Version < 4.1.133.Final is affected
Vendor io.netty
Product netty-codec-http2
Versions
  • Version >= 4.2.0.Alpha1, < 4.2.13.Final is affected
  • Version < 4.1.133.Final is affected

References

Problem Types

  • CWE-400: Uncontrolled Resource Consumption CWE