Denial of service vulnerability in GitHub Enterprise Server allowed service disruption via unauthenticated API endpoint

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Summary

CVECVE-2026-7541
StatePUBLISHED
AssignerGitHub_P
Source PriorityCVE Program / NVD first with legacy fallback
Published2026-05-07 22:16:36 UTC
Updated2026-05-11 17:19:36 UTC
DescriptionA denial of service vulnerability was identified in GitHub Enterprise Server that allowed an unauthenticated attacker to cause service disruption by sending crafted requests with deeply nested JSON payloads to an unauthenticated API endpoint. The endpoint parsed user-controlled JSON request bodies without size or depth limits, causing excessive CPU and memory consumption. This vulnerability affected all versions of GitHub Enterprise Server prior to 3.21 and was fixed in versions 3.20.2, 3.19.6, 3.18.9, 3.17.15, and 3.16.18. This vulnerability was reported via the GitHub Bug Bounty program.

Risk And Classification

Primary CVSS: v4.0 6.3 MEDIUM from [email protected]

CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:H/E:U/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X

EPSS: 0.000490000 probability, percentile 0.150940000 (date 2026-05-12)

Problem Types: CWE-770 | CWE-770 CWE-770 Allocation of resources without limits or throttling

VersionSourceTypeScoreSeverityVector
4.0[email protected]Secondary6.3MEDIUMCVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:H/E:U/C...
4.0CNACVSS6.3MEDIUMCVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:H/E:U
3.1[email protected]Primary7.5HIGHCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

CVSS v4.0 Breakdown

Attack Vector
Network
Attack Complexity
Low
Attack Requirements
Present
Privileges Required
None
User Interaction
None
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High
Sub Conf.
None
Sub Integrity
None
Sub Availability
High

CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:H/E:U/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X

CVSS v3.1 Breakdown

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

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

NVD Known Affected Configurations (CPE 2.3)

TypeVendorProductVersionUpdateEditionLanguage
Application Github Enterprise Server All All All All

Vendor Declared Affected Products

SourceVendorProductVersionPlatforms
CNA GitHub Enterprise Server affected 3.16.0 3.16.17 semver Not specified
CNA GitHub Enterprise Server affected 3.17.0 3.17.14 semver Not specified
CNA GitHub Enterprise Server affected 3.18.0 3.18.8 semver Not specified
CNA GitHub Enterprise Server affected 3.19.0 3.19.5 semver Not specified
CNA GitHub Enterprise Server affected 3.20.0 3.20.1 semver Not specified

References

ReferenceSourceLinkTags
docs.github.com/en/[email protected]/admin/release-notes [email protected] docs.github.com Release Notes, Vendor Advisory
docs.github.com/en/[email protected]/admin/release-notes [email protected] docs.github.com Release Notes, Vendor Advisory
docs.github.com/en/[email protected]/admin/release-notes [email protected] docs.github.com Release Notes, Vendor Advisory
docs.github.com/en/[email protected]/admin/release-notes [email protected] docs.github.com Release Notes, Vendor Advisory
docs.github.com/en/[email protected]/admin/release-notes [email protected] docs.github.com Release Notes, Vendor Advisory
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: Nguyen Nhat Anh (GitHub: anh2025) (en)

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