CVE-2026-49852

joserfc: HS256/HS384/HS512 verify accepts empty/nil HMAC key (cross-language sibling of CVE-2026-45363)

HIGH
8.7
CVSS Score
Published: July 17, 2026 at 07:14 PM UTC
Updated: October 24, 2026 at 08:10 PM UTC
1 product affected across 1 vendorJoserfc

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Severity
HIGH8.7
Exploit prediction
EPSS 0.2%
SSVC
PoC

Description

joserfc is a Python library that provides an implementation of several JSON Object Signing and Encryption (JOSE) standards. Prior to 1.6.8, joserfc.jwt.decode accepts attacker-forged HMAC-signed tokens when the caller-supplied verification key is the empty string or None, because HMACAlgorithm.sign and HMACAlgorithm.verify in src/joserfc/_rfc7518/jws_algs.py pass the output of OctKey.get_op_key(...) to hmac.new(...) and OctKey.import_key in src/joserfc/_rfc7518/oct_key.py only emits a SecurityWarning for keys shorter than 14 bytes without rejecting zero-length input. This issue is fixed in version 1.6.8.

Affected

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

v < 1.6.8
Affected range stops below 1.6.8, so it looks safe — our inference, not a vendor statement

Remediation

No guide yet

No remediation guidance has been written for this CVE yet, and no fixed version or vendor advisory is recorded against it.

SSVC — Action Prioritization

SSVCPoCAutomatablePartial impact

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

CVSS

8.7HIGHGitHub_M
Vector?

Quick Info

StatusDEFERRED
CWE
CWE-287CWE-326CWE-1391

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