Netty is an asynchronous, event-driven network application framework. Prior to 4.1.137.Fina and 4.2.17.Final, io.netty.handler.ssl.SslClientHelloHandler#decode checks the wrong offset before reading the four-byte TLS handshake header, so a ClientHello whose handshake header spans records can cause an IndexOutOfBoundsException and invoke select(ctx, null). This selects the default SslContext instead of the SNI-specific context. In deployments where per-SNI clientAuth=REQUIRE is the sole mutual TLS gate, the default SslContext uses clientAuth=NONE or clientAuth=OPTIONAL, and no application-layer certificate verification exists, an unauthenticated remote attacker can bypass the protected route's mutual TLS requirement. This issue is fixed in versions 4.1.137.Final and 4.2.17.Final.
Fix
Patch, vendor advisory and mitigation references on NVD 5
- https://github.com/netty/netty/commit/1b5abc6443b63726c72cdd285af2feb7ddbb8ff7 Patch
- https://github.com/netty/netty/commit/9e0519239108a69b7e9bbc5e9182ee139a0d7961 Patch
- https://github.com/netty/netty/pull/17213 Issue Tracking, Patch
- https://github.com/netty/netty/pull/17217 Issue Tracking, Patch
- https://github.com/netty/netty/security/advisories/GHSA-c4c3-7fpv-j4q5 Vendor Advisory
Every line above is quoted from NVD, CISA, Microsoft, the vendor's own advisory or DISA; nothing is generated.
Change history 1
- First seenCVSS 9.1 · nettyNVD modified 2026-10-26 10:10
Affected (CPE criteria) 1
cpe:2.3:a:netty:netty:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
References 7
- https://github.com/netty/netty/commit/1b5abc6443b63726c72cdd285af2feb7ddbb8ff7 Patch
- https://github.com/netty/netty/commit/9e0519239108a69b7e9bbc5e9182ee139a0d7961 Patch
- https://github.com/netty/netty/pull/17213 Issue Tracking, Patch
- https://github.com/netty/netty/pull/17217 Issue Tracking, Patch
- https://github.com/netty/netty/releases/tag/netty-4.1.137.Final Release Notes
- https://github.com/netty/netty/releases/tag/netty-4.2.17.Final Release Notes
- https://github.com/netty/netty/security/advisories/GHSA-c4c3-7fpv-j4q5 Vendor Advisory