CVE-2026-53994

NameCVE-2026-53994
DescriptionProFTPD mod_sftp contains a heap-based buffer overflow reachable by an authenticated SFTP user. The fxp_packet_read() function accepts the attacker-supplied 32-bit big-endian SFTP packet length without a minimum sanity check. A value of 0 causes an unsigned subtraction elsewhere in the read path to underflow to approximately 4 GB. That oversized request reaches the core memory allocator, where the rounded size is computed in size_t but passed to new_block() as a 32-bit int; the low 32 bits of 0x100000000 are 0, so new_block() returns a small (~512-byte) block while the caller is told it received ~4 GB. The subsequent fill loop then streams attacker-controlled bytes past the end of the 544-byte allocation, producing an attacker-controlled heap buffer overflow. An authenticated user can crash the per-connection ProFTPD session child on demand with a single malformed SFTP packet (packet_len=0 followed by a body greater than approximately 544 bytes), producing reliable authenticated remote denial of service. Depending on heap layout and adjacent allocations, heap metadata corruption and further consequences beyond denial of service may be possible, though only denial of service is demonstrated by the supplied proof of concept.
SourceCVE (at NVD; CERT, ENISA, LWN, oss-sec, fulldisc, Debian ELTS, Red Hat, Ubuntu, Gentoo, SUSE bugzilla/CVE, GitHub advisories/code/issues, web search, more)

Vulnerable and fixed packages

The table below lists information on source packages.

Source PackageReleaseVersionStatus
proftpd-dfsg (PTS)bullseye1.3.7a+dfsg-12+deb11u2vulnerable
bullseye (security)1.3.7a+dfsg-12+deb11u5vulnerable
bookworm1.3.8+dfsg-4+deb12u5vulnerable
bookworm (security)1.3.8+dfsg-4+deb12u4vulnerable
trixie1.3.8.c+dfsg-4+deb13u2vulnerable
forky, sid1.3.9c~dfsg-1fixed

The information below is based on the following data on fixed versions.

PackageTypeReleaseFixed VersionUrgencyOriginDebian Bugs
proftpd-dfsgsource(unstable)1.3.9b~dfsg-1

Notes

https://github.com/proftpd/proftpd/issues/2115
Fixed by: https://github.com/proftpd/proftpd/commit/8685930f5e2e448563ef31d8871553308b954785 (v1.3.9b)
Fixed by: https://github.com/proftpd/proftpd/commit/a237fa62341bf882c7edc4e5e8cc492cec851d0b (v1.3.9b)
Fixed by: https://github.com/proftpd/proftpd/commit/8ccd66576da8c3e4ca678335268905e00bc71bdb (v1.3.9b)
Fixed by: https://github.com/proftpd/proftpd/commit/226c85b97aa75cef4bdd74e7012b313a801796b5 (v1.3.9b)

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