Extra fix for CVE-2026-40622 to also clamp the TTL of A/AAAA records disallowing a one-time 'ghost domain' delegation renewal via glue records

MITRE NVD CVE.ORG JSON API

Summary

CVECVE-2026-42955
StatePUBLISHED
AssignerNLnet Labs
Source PriorityCVE Program / NVD first with legacy fallback
Published2026-07-22 14:17:18 UTC
Updated2026-07-22 20:33:11 UTC
DescriptionIn NLnet Labs Unbound 1.16.2 up to and including 1.25.1, a similar vulnerability as with CVE-2026-40622 in the 'ghost domain names' family of attacks was found in Unbound that could extend the ghost domain window by up to one cached TTL configured value for A/AAAA glue records. Similar to other 'ghost domain names' attacks, an adversary needs to control a (ghost) zone and be able to query a vulnerable Unbound. A single client A/AAAA query can cause Unbound to overwrite the cached expired parent-side glue rrset and essentially extend the ghost domain window by up to one cached TTL configured value ('cache-max-ttl'). In configurations where 'harden-referral-path: yes' is used (non-default configuration), no client query is required since Unbound implicitly performs that query. This is a variant of CVE-2026-40622 which only addressed the NS query.

Risk And Classification

Primary CVSS: v3.1 3.7 LOW from [email protected]

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

Problem Types: CWE-672 | CWE-672 CWE-672: Operation on a Resource after Expiration or Release

VersionSourceTypeScoreSeverityVector
3.1[email protected]Secondary3.7LOWCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N
3.1CNACVSS3.7LOWCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:N

CVSS v3.1 Breakdown

Attack Vector
Network
Attack Complexity
High
Privileges Required
None
User Interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
Low
Availability
None

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

Vendor Declared Affected Products

SourceVendorProductVersionPlatforms
CNA NLnet Labs Unbound affected 1.16.2 1.25.2 semver Not specified

References

ReferenceSourceLinkTags
www.nlnetlabs.nl/downloads/unbound/CVE-2026-42955.txt [email protected] www.nlnetlabs.nl
CVE Program record CVE.ORG www.cve.org canonical
NVD vulnerability detail NVD nvd.nist.gov canonical, analysis

Vendor Comments And Credit

Discovery Credit

CNA: Qifan Zhang (Palo Alto Networks) (en)

Additional Advisory Data

SourceTimeEvent
CNA2026-05-22T00:00:00.000ZIssue reported by Qifan Zhang
CNA2026-06-10T00:00:00.000ZNLnet Labs shares patch
CNA2026-06-13T00:00:00.000ZQifan Zhang verifies patch
CNA2026-07-22T00:00:00.000ZFixes released with version 1.25.2

Solutions

CNA: This issue is fixed starting with version 1.25.2

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