Medium severity · published Sep 16, 2026
CVE-2026-77955
Possible ZONEMD verification bypass window
4.4
CVSS
0.2%
EPSS
No
On KEV
Description
In NLnet Labs Unbound 1.13.2 up to and including 1.26.1, a vulnerability in ZONEMD configured zones (zonemd-check: yes) which are located below (but not at) a trust anchor allow for an attack window where (tampered with) zone contents are served (or stored to disk) prior to the ZONEMD integrity check. This is caused by the needed DS/DNSKEY asynchronous resolution that needs to happen before the ZONEMD check completes. If a zonefile is written to disk (zonefile: option) while the ZONEMD check failed, the tampered data are reloaded on startup and available until ZONEMD verification concludes again. If verification fails, the data is not served any more but still persists on disk for future reloads.
CVSS vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N
Attack vector
Network
Complexity
High
Privileges
High
User interaction
None
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
High
Availability
None
Scope
Unchanged
Exploitation
Is it being used?
Exploit prediction (EPSS)0.2% · higher than 7% of CVEs
Exploited in the wildNo evidence yet
CISA KEVNot listed
Ransomware campaign useNot known
Affected products
Which versions
UN
Unbound · NLnet Labs
1.13.2 before 1.26.1 · source: vendor, NVD
References
NVD
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-77955
CVE.org
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-77955
Patch
https://www.nlnetlabs.nl/downloads/unbound/CVE-2026-77955.txt
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