CVE-2023-0465

Invalid certificate policies in leaf certificates are silently ignored

MEDIUM
5.3
CVSS Score
Published: March 28, 2023 at 02:30 PM UTC
Updated: October 14, 2026 at 08:17 PM UTC
1 product affected across 1 vendorOpenSSL

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Severity
MEDIUM5.3
Exploit prediction
EPSS 2%
SSVC
No known exploit

Description

Applications that use a non-default option when verifying certificates may be vulnerable to an attack from a malicious CA to circumvent certain checks. Invalid certificate policies in leaf certificates are silently ignored by OpenSSL and other certificate policy checks are skipped for that certificate. A malicious CA could use this to deliberately assert invalid certificate policies in order to circumvent policy checking on the certificate altogether. Policy processing is disabled by default but can be enabled by passing the `-policy' argument to the command line utilities or by calling the `X509_VERIFY_PARAM_set1_policies()' function.

Affected

Our own answer: ranges merged, affected separated from platform-only, with confidence and review flags.

1.0.2 ≤ v < 1.0.2zh1.1.1 ≤ v < 1.1.1u3.0.0 ≤ v < 3.0.93.1.0 ≤ v < 3.1.11.0.21.1.13.0.03.1.0
Affected range stops below 1.0.2zh, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement
Affected range stops below 1.1.1u, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement
Affected range stops below 3.0.9, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement
Affected range stops below 3.1.1, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement

SSVC — Action Prioritization

SSVCNo known exploitAutomatablePartial impact

SSVC signals action urgency (what to patch first), separate from CVSS which measures severity.

CVSS

5.3MEDIUMCISA-ADP
Attack Vector
NETWORK
Complexity
LOW
Privileges
NONE
User Interaction
NONE
Scope
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality
NONE
Integrity
LOW
Availability
NONE
Vector?

Quick Info

StatusMODIFIED
CWE
CWE-295

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