Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2026-21441

high Nessus Plugin ID 282456

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Synopsis

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed with a vulnerability that the vendor indicates will not be patched.

Description

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed that are impacted by a vulnerability without a vendor supplied patch available.

- urllib3 is an HTTP client library for Python. urllib3's streaming API is designed for the efficient handling of large HTTP responses by reading the content in chunks, rather than loading the entire response body into memory at once. urllib3 can perform decoding or decompression based on the HTTP `Content- Encoding` header (e.g., `gzip`, `deflate`, `br`, or `zstd`). When using the streaming API, the library decompresses only the necessary bytes, enabling partial content consumption. Starting in version 1.22 and prior to version 2.6.3, for HTTP redirect responses, the library would read the entire response body to drain the connection and decompress the content unnecessarily. This decompression occurred even before any read methods were called, and configured read limits did not restrict the amount of decompressed data. As a result, there was no safeguard against decompression bombs. A malicious server could exploit this to trigger excessive resource consumption on the client. Applications and libraries are affected when they stream content from untrusted sources by setting `preload_content=False` when they do not disable redirects. Users should upgrade to at least urllib3 v2.6.3, in which the library does not decode content of redirect responses when `preload_content=False`. If upgrading is not immediately possible, disable redirects by setting `redirect=False` for requests to untrusted source. (CVE-2026-21441)

Note that Nessus relies on the presence of the package as reported by the vendor.

Solution

There is no known solution at this time.

Plugin Details

Severity: High

ID: 282456

File Name: unpatched_CVE_2026_21441.nasl

Version: 1.3

Type: local

Agent: unix

Family: Misc.

Published: 1/8/2026

Updated: 1/10/2026

Supported Sensors: Frictionless Assessment AWS, Frictionless Assessment Azure, Frictionless Assessment Agent, Nessus Agent, Agentless Assessment, Nessus

Risk Information

VPR

Risk Factor: Low

Score: 3.2

CVSS v2

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 5

Temporal Score: 4.3

Vector: CVSS2#AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N

CVSS Score Source: CVE-2026-21441

CVSS v3

Risk Factor: Medium

Base Score: 4.7

Temporal Score: 4.3

Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:L/I:N/A:N

Temporal Vector: CVSS:3.0/E:U/RL:U/RC:C

CVSS v4

Risk Factor: High

Base Score: 8.9

Threat Score: 6.3

Threat Vector: CVSS:4.0/E:U

Vector: CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:H

Vulnerability Information

CPE: cpe:/o:debian:debian_linux:11.0, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:18.04:-:lts, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:20.04:-:lts, p-cpe:/a:debian:debian_linux:python-urllib3, p-cpe:/a:canonical:ubuntu_linux:python-urllib3, p-cpe:/a:canonical:ubuntu_linux:python-pip, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:22.04:-:lts, cpe:/o:debian:debian_linux:12.0, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:24.04:-:lts, cpe:/o:debian:debian_linux:13.0, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:25.04, cpe:/o:debian:debian_linux:14.0, cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:25.10

Required KB Items: Host/local_checks_enabled, Host/cpu, global_settings/vendor_unpatched, Host/OS/identifier

Exploit Ease: No known exploits are available

Vulnerability Publication Date: 1/7/2026

Reference Information

CVE: CVE-2026-21441

Detections

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