CVE-2026-46545: nimiq-primitives Denial of Service Vulnerability

HIGH
Advisory Identifier: GHSA-mw3q-r9wh-h2ff
CVSS 7.5
CWE-248
Published
Advisory Summary

CVE-2026-46545 is a HIGH (CVSS 7.5) denial of service vulnerability (CWE-248: Uncaught Exception) affecting nimiq-primitives libraries in the crates.io ecosystem. The issue involves panic dos in trie chunk processing via root-keyed item. Remediation is available by upgrading affected packages to version 1.5.0.

CVE-2026-46545 at a Glance

CVE Identifier CVE-2026-46545
GHSA Identifier GHSA-mw3q-r9wh-h2ff
Severity HIGH
CVSS v3.1 Base Score 7.5
CWE Classification CWE-248: Uncaught Exception
Affected Product nimiq-primitives
Package Ecosystem crates.io
Published Date
Last Updated

Security Impact

CVSS: 7.5

The security impact metrics below are parsed directly from the CVSS v3.1 vector string (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H).

Attack Vector Network (AV:N)
Attack Complexity Low (AC:L)
Privileges Required None (PR:N)
User Interaction None (UI:N)
Scope Unchanged (S:U)
Confidentiality None (C:N)
Integrity None (I:N)
Availability High (A:H)

How to Fix CVE-2026-46545

To remediate this vulnerability, upgrade all affected nimiq-primitives dependencies to a patched release. Both direct and transitive dependencies should be checked, as frameworks or security libraries may pull in vulnerable versions transitively.

nimiq-primitives fixed: 1.5.0
Upgrade nimiq-primitives to 1.5.0
Verify Direct and Transitive Dependencies

Run the following command in your project directory to verify that all resolved dependencies use the patched release:

inspect dependencies for nimiq-primitives

How to Check if You Are Affected

To determine whether your application is affected by CVE-2026-46545, inspect your project dependencies for nimiq-primitives:

inspect dependencies for nimiq-primitives

Analyze the terminal output to locate any version of nimiq-primitives in your dependency tree. If any resolved version matches the vulnerable ranges listed in the table below (for example, versions earlier than 1.5.0), your application is affected.

Note: Verify declared build manifests and deployed runtime container environments.

Technical Details

Vulnerability Mechanism & Technical Analysis

This vulnerability is classified under CWE-248: Uncaught Exception, where an exception is thrown from a function, but it is not caught. In nimiq-primitives, software state validation or input boundaries are circumvented during processing. Review the official source advisory statement below for specific affected components, classes, and reproduction details.

Source Advisory Statement

### Impact A remote, unauthenticated denial-of-service vulnerability in `MerkleRadixTrie::put_chunk` allows any state-sync peer to crash any node performing state synchronization (freshly joining nodes and recovering nodes). A malicious peer can respond to a `RequestChunk` with a `ResponseChunk::Chunk` whose first `TrieItem.key` is the empty (ROOT) key. The chunk passes sorting, range, and Merkle-proof validation, but when `put_raw` tries to store a value at the root node, it calls `TrieNode::put_value(...).unwrap()`, which returns `Err(RootCantHaveValue)` and panics, aborting the node process. The panic fires on the first malicious chunk the victim commits; no rate limit or authentication gate caps the attack. Impacted: any node running state sync against untrusted peers — this includes fresh nodes performing initial download and existing nodes recovering from data loss. Honest nodes never construct ROOT-keyed items, so non-syncing operation is unaffected. ### Patches See [PR](https://github.com/nimiq/core-rs-albatross/pull/3762). ### Workarounds There is no safe in-process workaround: any peer serving state-sync data can trigger the crash and the code path is not guarded by a feature flag. ### Resources - Fix commit: (link to the merged PR commit, once merged) - Affected code: [`primitives/trie/src/trie.rs`](https://github.com/nimiq/core-rs-albatross/blob/albatross/primitives/trie/src/trie.rs) — `put_chunk` (around line 819) and `put_raw` (around line 351)

CVE-2026-46545 Affected nimiq-primitives Versions

1 component(s)
Fixed Versions:
1.5.0
Product / Package Ecosystem Affected Versions Fixed Version
nimiq-primitives
crates.io
< 1.5.0
1.5.0

References

Frequently Asked Questions

What is CVE-2026-46545?
CVE-2026-46545 is a security vulnerability in nimiq-primitives involving Panic DoS in trie chunk processing via ROOT-keyed item under CWE-248: Uncaught Exception.
Which nimiq-primitives versions are affected?
Affected versions include releases prior to 1.5.0 across affected packages: nimiq-primitives.
What version fixes CVE-2026-46545?
Upgrading to 1.5.0 (or the latest patched release for your respective branch) resolves the vulnerability.
Is nimiq-primitives affected?
Yes, nimiq-primitives is affected in releases prior to 1.5.0. Upgrade your dependency to 1.5.0 or later.
What is the CVSS score of CVE-2026-46545?
CVE-2026-46545 has a CVSS v3.1 base score of 7.5 (HIGH) with vector string CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H.
What CWE is associated with CVE-2026-46545?
CVE-2026-46545 is classified under CWE-248: Uncaught Exception (An exception is thrown from a function, but it is not caught.).
How can I check crates.io dependencies for CVE-2026-46545?
Run the dependency tree command: 'inspect dependencies for nimiq-primitives'. This command lists direct and transitive dependencies in your build configuration so you can verify if a vulnerable version is resolved.
Machine-readable OSV JSON OSV v1.5 Schema
Normalized schema output
{
  "schema_version" : "1.4.0",
  "id" : "GHSA-mw3q-r9wh-h2ff",
  "modified" : "2026-06-10T13:41:41Z",
  "published" : "2026-05-21T19:50:31Z",
  "aliases" : [ "CVE-2026-46545" ],
  "summary" : "nimiq-primitives: Panic DoS in trie chunk processing via ROOT-keyed item",
  "details" : "### Impact\n\nA remote, unauthenticated denial-of-service vulnerability in `MerkleRadixTrie::put_chunk` allows any state-sync peer to crash any node performing state synchronization (freshly joining nodes and recovering nodes).\n\nA malicious peer can respond to a `RequestChunk` with a `ResponseChunk::Chunk` whose first `TrieItem.key` is the empty (ROOT) key. The chunk passes sorting, range, and Merkle-proof validation, but when `put_raw` tries to store a value at the root node, it calls `TrieNode::put_value(...).unwrap()`, which returns `Err(RootCantHaveValue)` and panics, aborting the node process. The panic fires on the first malicious chunk the victim commits; no rate limit or authentication gate caps the attack.\n\nImpacted: any node running state sync against untrusted peers — this includes fresh nodes performing initial download and existing nodes recovering from data loss. Honest nodes never construct ROOT-keyed items, so non-syncing operation is unaffected.\n\n### Patches\n\nSee [PR](https://github.com/nimiq/core-rs-albatross/pull/3762).\n\n### Workarounds\n\nThere is no safe in-process workaround: any peer serving state-sync data can trigger the crash and the code path is not guarded by a feature flag.\n\n### Resources\n\n- Fix commit: (link to the merged PR commit, once merged)\n- Affected code: [`primitives/trie/src/trie.rs`](https://github.com/nimiq/core-rs-albatross/blob/albatross/primitives/trie/src/trie.rs) — `put_chunk` (around line 819) and `put_raw` (around line 351)",
  "severity" : [ {
    "type" : "CVSS_V3",
    "score" : "CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H"
  } ],
  "affected" : [ {
    "package" : {
      "ecosystem" : "crates.io",
      "name" : "nimiq-primitives"
    },
    "ranges" : [ {
      "type" : "ECOSYSTEM",
      "events" : [ {
        "introduced" : "0"
      }, {
        "fixed" : "1.5.0"
      } ]
    } ]
  } ],
  "references" : [ {
    "type" : "WEB",
    "url" : "https://github.com/nimiq/core-rs-albatross/security/advisories/GHSA-mw3q-r9wh-h2ff"
  }, {
    "type" : "ADVISORY",
    "url" : "https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-46545"
  }, {
    "type" : "WEB",
    "url" : "https://github.com/nimiq/core-rs-albatross/pull/3762"
  }, {
    "type" : "WEB",
    "url" : "https://github.com/nimiq/core-rs-albatross/commit/0fb8766adea91e038af00e635a6eb92756e50172"
  }, {
    "type" : "PACKAGE",
    "url" : "https://github.com/nimiq/core-rs-albatross"
  }, {
    "type" : "WEB",
    "url" : "https://github.com/nimiq/core-rs-albatross/releases/tag/v1.5.0"
  } ],
  "database_specific" : {
    "cwe_ids" : [ "CWE-248" ],
    "severity" : "HIGH",
    "github_reviewed" : true,
    "github_reviewed_at" : "2026-05-21T19:50:31Z",
    "nvd_published_at" : "2026-06-10T00:16:54Z"
  }
}