CVE-2026-119190
Description
A flaw was found in node-forge. The certificate verification mechanism improperly parses deprecated extension identifiers as standard basic constraints when validating certificate chains. An attacker holding a certificate issued by a trusted Certificate Authority (CA) with a permissive deprecated extension can bypass validation checks to act as a certificate authority. This flaw allows an attacker to generate unauthorized certificates for arbitrary domains, enabling server or client impersonation and interception of sensitive network traffic.
Statement
This vulnerability is rated as Important because an attacker possessing an intermediate or leaf certificate with legacy attributes issued by a trusted certificate authority can circumvent path validation to forge arbitrary certificates, resulting in a severe breach of confidentiality and integrity. While exploitation complexity is elevated by the requirement of obtaining a certificate that includes specific deprecated extension entries, successful abuse allows complete network traffic interception and identity impersonation. Within Red Hat environments, exposure is focused on applications and administrative interfaces utilizing bundled node-forge components for TLS connection establishment and custom certificate chain validation.
Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details
Info alert:Important note
CVSS scores for open source components depend on vendor-specific factors (e.g. version or build chain). Therefore, Red Hat's score and impact rating can be different from NVD and other vendors. Red Hat remains the authoritative CVE Naming Authority (CNA) source for its products and services (see Red Hat classifications).
The following CVSS metrics and score provided are preliminary and subject to review.
CVSS v3 Score Breakdown
| Red Hat | NVD | cve.org | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base Score | 7.4 | N/A | 7.4 |
| Attack Vector | Network | N/A | Network |
| Attack Complexity | High | N/A | High |
| Privileges Required | None | N/A | None |
| User Interaction | None | N/A | None |
| Scope | Unchanged | N/A | Unchanged |
| Confidentiality | High | N/A | High |
| Integrity Impact | High | N/A | High |
| Availability Impact | None | N/A | None |
Vector
Red Hat: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N
cve.org: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N
Understanding the Weakness (CWE)
Integrity,Authentication
Technical Impact: Bypass Protection Mechanism; Gain Privileges or Assume Identity
When a certificate is invalid or malicious, it might allow an attacker to spoof a trusted entity by interfering in the communication path between the host and client. The product might connect to a malicious host while believing it is a trusted host, or the product might be deceived into accepting spoofed data that appears to originate from a trusted host.
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