NGINX Vulnerability Exploit Code Released, Poses Security Risks
Technical details and proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit code for a critical vulnerability in NGINX have been published. The vulnerability, identified as CVE-2026-42945, has a CVSS score of 9.2 and was recently patched by F5. It involves a heap buffer overflow in the ngx_http_rewrite_module component, which can lead to a denial-of-service (DoS) condition or remote code execution (RCE) if Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) is disabled. The issue affects NGINX servers using rewrite and set directives, stemming from a two-pass process in the script engine that can result in an undersized buffer allocation. This allows attacker-controlled data to overflow the buffer. The vulnerability was introduced 16 years ago and has now been addressed in NGINX Plus versions 37.0.0, R36 P4, and R32 P6, as well as in NGINX open source versions 1.31.0 and 1.30.1.