High severity · published May 27, 2026
CVE-2026-42790
nameConstraints DNS bypass via subject CommonName fallback in public_key hostname verification
8.1
CVSS
0.3%
EPSS
No
On KEV
Description
Improper Certificate Validation vulnerability in Erlang OTP public_key (pubkey_cert and public_key modules) allows a DNS nameConstraints bypass via subject CommonName fallback in TLS hostname verification.
Two flaws combine to allow a subordinate CA whose DNS nameConstraints are restricted (e.g. permitted;DNS:allowed.example.com) to issue a leaf certificate that an OTP TLS client accepts as a valid identity for an out-of-scope hostname (e.g. victim.example.com):
First, pubkey_cert:validate_names/6 in lib/public_key/src/pubkey_cert.erl only checks SAN DNS entries against nameConstraints. Per RFC 5280, a permitted DNS subtree only restricts certificates that contain a DNS-typed name. A leaf with no subjectAltName therefore trivially satisfies any permitted;DNS:... constraint regardless of its subject commonName.
Second, public_key:pkix_verify_hostname/3 in lib/public_key/src/public_key.erl falls back to the subject commonName when no subjectAltName is present, extracting id-at-commonName attributes as presented IDs and matching them against the reference hostname. The strict pkix_verify_hostname_match_fun(https) matcher does not suppress this fallback.
The result is that path validation accepts a CN-only leaf under a DNS-constrained intermediate (no SAN means the nameConstraints are not triggered), and hostname verification then accepts it via the CN fallback. The bypass is reachable from stock ssl:connect with verify_peer, a trusted CA, SNI, and the canonical strict https hostname matcher.
This issue affects OTP from OTP 19.3 before OTP 29.0.1, OTP 28.5.0.1, OTP 27.3.4.12 and OTP 26.2.5.21, corresponding to public_key from 1.4 before 1.21.1, 1.20.3.1, 1.17.1.3 and 1.15.1.7.
CVSS vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N
Attack vector
Network
Complexity
Low
Privileges
None
User interaction
Required
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
None
Scope
Unchanged
Exploitation
Is it being used?
Exploit prediction (EPSS)0.3% · higher than 28% of CVEs
Exploited in the wildNo evidence yet
CISA KEVNot listed
Ransomware campaign useNot known
Affected products
Which versions
OT
OTP · Erlang
1.4; 19.3; b0c245e8132bb13171e277b1af59c0cec00c9459 · source: vendor
ER
Erlang/otp · Erlang
19.3 before 26.2.5.21; 27.0 before 27.3.4.12; 28.0 before 28.5.0.1; 29.0 before 29.0.1 · source: NVD
RH
Red Hat Hardened Images · Red Hat
All versions, or not specified · source: CISA
RH
Red Hat OpenStack Platform 16.2 · Red Hat
All versions, or not specified · source: CISA
RH
Red Hat OpenStack Platform 17.1 · Red Hat
All versions, or not specified · source: CISA
RH
Red Hat OpenStack Services on OpenShift 18.0 · Red Hat
All versions, or not specified · source: CISA
References
NVD
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-42790
CVE.org
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-42790
Third Party Advisory
https://cna.erlef.org/cves/CVE-2026-42790.html
Patch
https://github.com/erlang/otp/commit/0769050c69d73762672b0db1347b6993a5b31759
Patch
https://github.com/erlang/otp/commit/21abed64eb2026b5f82f432709e4e932f9be389a
Patch
https://github.com/erlang/otp/commit/fb67c6d1836f51105a96d8b769e71e4215a79457
Vendor Advisory
https://github.com/erlang/otp/security/advisories/GHSA-22cw-4ph4-6447
Mitigation
https://osv.dev/vulnerability/EEF-CVE-2026-42790
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