Critical severity · published Aug 20, 2026
CVE-2026-73251
Mongoose Built-in TLS: CA-bundle certificate chain accepted without any signature verification
9.1
CVSS
0.2%
EPSS
No
On KEV
Description
Mongoose is an embedded web server and network library. Prior to 7.23, a network attacker can impersonate a TLS server to a Mongoose client configured with a multi-certificate CA bundle. In src/tls_builtin.c, the mg_tls_init() function stores the bundle in tls->ca_bundle_der while tls->ca_der.len remains zero, and mg_tls_recv_cert() uses tls_bundle_find() to accept a Common Name match without calling mg_tls_verify_cert_signature(). A forged self-signed certificate can therefore satisfy hostname and CertificateVerify checks and enable interception, credential disclosure, traffic modification, and malicious responses. This issue is fixed in version 7.23.
CVSS vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N
Attack vector
Network
Complexity
Low
Privileges
None
User interaction
None
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
None
Scope
Unchanged
Exploitation
Is it being used?
Exploit prediction (EPSS)0.2% · higher than 9% of CVEs
Exploited in the wildNo evidence yet
CISA KEVNot listed
Ransomware campaign useNot known
Affected products
Which versions
MO
mongoose · cesanta
< 7.23 · source: vendor, NVD
References
NVD
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-73251
CVE.org
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-73251
Patch
https://github.com/cesanta/mongoose/commit/2988bc9df3a5efc9539471cb7455975fa25df483
Release Notes
https://github.com/cesanta/mongoose/releases/tag/7.23
Vendor Advisory
https://github.com/cesanta/mongoose/security/advisories/GHSA-qj6j-2692-v2r8
More from mongoose
9.8
CVE-2026-5244
Cesanta Mongoose TLS 1.3 mongoose.c mg_tls_recv_cert heap-based overflow
9.8
CVE-2024-42383
Use of Out-of-range Pointer Offset vulnerability in Cesanta Mongoose Web Server v7.14 allows to write a NULL byte value beyond the memory space dedicated for the hostname field
9.8
CVE-2020-25756
A buffer overflow vulnerability exists in the mg_get_http_header function in Cesanta Mongoose 6.18 due to a lack of bounds checking
9.8
CVE-2019-19307
An integer overflow in parse_mqtt in mongoose.c in Cesanta Mongoose 6.16 allows an attacker to achieve remote DoS (infinite loop), or possibly cause an out-of-bounds write, by…
9.8
CVE-2019-12951
An issue was discovered in Mongoose before 6.15
