CVE-2026-32688

April 27, 2026, 6:57 p.m.

8.7
High

Description

Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling vulnerability in elixir-plug plug_cowboy allows unauthenticated remote denial of service via atom table exhaustion. Plug.Cowboy.Conn.conn/1 in lib/plug/cowboy/conn.ex calls String.to_atom/1 on the value returned by :cowboy_req.scheme/1. For HTTP/2 connections, cowlib passes the client-supplied :scheme pseudo-header value through verbatim without validation. Each unique value permanently allocates a new entry in the BEAM atom table. Since atoms are never garbage-collected and the atom table has a fixed limit (default 1,048,576), an unauthenticated attacker can exhaust the table by sending HTTP/2 requests with unique :scheme values, causing the Erlang VM to abort with system_limit and taking down the entire node. This vulnerability does not affect HTTP/1.1, where cowboy derives the scheme from the listener type rather than from a client-supplied header. This issue affects plug_cowboy: from 2.0.0 before 2.8.1.

Product(s) Impacted

Vendor Product Versions
Elixir-plug
  • Plug Cowboy
  • 2.0.0-2.8.1

Weaknesses

Common security weaknesses mapped to this vulnerability.

CWE-770
Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling
The product allocates a reusable resource or group of resources on behalf of an actor without imposing any restrictions on the size or number of resources that can be allocated, in violation of the intended security policy for that actor.

*CPE(s)

Affected systems and software identified for this CVE.

Type Vendor Product Version Update Edition Language Software Edition Target Software Target Hardware Other Information
a elixir-plug plug_cowboy 2.0.0-2.8.1 / / / / / / /

References

https://cna.erlef.org/cves/CVE-2026-32688.html
https://github.com/elixir-plug/plug_cowboy/commit/bfb34cb45eb354e56437f7023fb306de1bf9c19b
https://github.com/elixir-plug/plug_cowboy/security/advisories/GHSA-q8x4-x7mp-5vg2
https://osv.dev/vulnerability/EEF-CVE-2026-32688

Tags

CWE-770
6b3ad84c-e1a6-4bf7-a703-f496b71e49db
2026-04-27
CVE-2026-32688

CVSS Score

8.7 / 10

CVSS Data - 4.0

  • Attack Vector: NETWORK
  • Attack Complexity: LOW
  • Attack Requirements: NONE
  • Privileges Required: NONE
  • User Interaction: NONE
  • Scope:
  • Confidentiality Impact: NONE
  • Integrity Impact: NONE
  • Availability Impact: HIGH
  • Exploit Maturity: NOT_DEFINED

    • CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X

    View Vector String

Timeline

Published: April 27, 2026, 2:16 p.m.
Last Modified: April 27, 2026, 6:57 p.m.

Status : Awaiting Analysis

CVE has been recently published to the CVE List and has been received by the NVD.

More info

Source

6b3ad84c-e1a6-4bf7-a703-f496b71e49db

*Disclaimer: Some vulnerabilities do not have an associated CPE. To enhance the data, we use AI to infer CPEs based on CVE details. This is an automated process and might not always be accurate.