CVE-2026-53587
libgit2 is a portable C implementation of the Git core methods provided as a linkable library with a solid API, allowing to build Git functionality into your application. Prior to 1.8.6 and 1.9.5, libgit2 performs a fixed-size strncmp in set_data in src/libgit2/transports/smart_pkt.c without first verifying that the smart-protocol pkt-line capability buffer contains 14 bytes. A malicious Git server can make bytes after the pkt-line complete object-format=, causing format_str to advance beyond the pkt-line and the following memchr length calculation to underflow. The resulting heap out-of-bounds walk can crash a client during the first refs-advertisement packet over HTTP, HTTPS, SSH, or the Git protocol. This issue is fixed in versions 1.8.6 and 1.9.5.
What this means for your business
- An attacker can use it remotely, over a network, without a login, and without anyone at your company clicking anything.
- FIRST's prediction model gives it a 0.5% chance of attack attempts being seen in the next 30 days, ranking above 39% of all known flaws.
What to do
- 1Ask your IT team or provider whether any of your systems use the affected product.
- 2If you do, follow the vendor's guidance. No patch reference has been published yet.
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Scoring
- CVSS
- 7.5 (v3.1)
- Vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H- Weakness
- CWE-20
- Assigned by
- security-advisories@github.com
Dates
- Published
- 2026-08-20
- Last modified
- 2026-09-09
- Sources
- NVD
References
- https://github.com/libgit2/libgit2/commit/2c0ce8c0132ac38ab0db28239462a671e2e5440e
- https://github.com/libgit2/libgit2/commit/affda60c10fcef16723451c0d7dc71b71dc20ad3
- https://github.com/libgit2/libgit2/commit/d7a9fb87f504434e9f45228678953c4fa56e7640
- https://github.com/libgit2/libgit2/releases/tag/v1.8.6
- https://github.com/libgit2/libgit2/releases/tag/v1.9.5
- https://github.com/libgit2/libgit2/security/advisories/GHSA-pm24-4jhq-3xvm
- https://github.com/libgit2/libgit2/security/advisories/GHSA-pm24-4jhq-3xvm