Vulnerability · Published Sep 1, 2026 · Assigned by EEF
CVE-2026-66835httpd mod_auth directory protection bypassed by a doubled slash in the request path
High 8.2
In plain English
A high-severity security flaw in OTP from Erlang. There are no confirmed reports of exploitation so far. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 1.0% (higher than 62% of all known vulnerabilities). Fixed versions are available - upgrade the affected package.
Official description
Path Equivalence vulnerability in Erlang/OTP inets httpd allows a remote unauthenticated attacker to read files inside a mod_auth protected directory by prefixing the request path with an extra slash. httpd_request:validate_uri/1 normalises the request URI with uri_string:normalize/1, which performs RFC 3986 dot-segment removal but does not collapse empty path segments, so a doubled slash survives. mod_alias:real_name/3 concatenates the document root with that URI, and mod_auth:secret_path/3 then decides whether the result lies inside a protected directory block by running the configured directory path as an unanchored regular expression against it. The doubled slash breaks the contiguous substring the regex needs, so the request is treated as unprotected and no authentication challenge is issued, while mod_get opens the same path and the operating system collapses the doubled slash and returns the protected file. The same path mismatch also evades the per-path accounting in mod_security. This issue affects OTP from OTP 17.0 before OTP 27.3.4.17, from OTP 28.0 before OTP 28.5.0.6, and from OTP 29.0 before OTP 29.0.6, corresponding to inets from 5.10 before 9.3.2.7, from 9.4 before 9.6.2.3, and from 9.7 before 9.7.2. Whether OTP before OTP 17.0, corresponding to inets before 5.10, is affected is unknown.
Affected packages & fixed versions
| Ecosystem | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| Debian:12 | erlang | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-66835 |
| Debian:13 | erlang | 1:27.3.4.1+dfsg-1+deb13u4 | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-66835 |
| Debian:14 | erlang | 1:29.0.6+dfsg-1 | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-66835 |
| Ubuntu:22.04:LTS | erlang | 1:24.2.1+dfsg-1ubuntu0.7 | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-66835 |
| Ubuntu:22.04:LTS | erlang | 1:24.2.1+dfsg-1ubuntu0.7 | USN-8827-1 |
| Ubuntu:24.04:LTS | erlang | 1:25.3.2.8+dfsg-1ubuntu4.7 | USN-8827-1 |
| Ubuntu:24.04:LTS | erlang | 1:25.3.2.8+dfsg-1ubuntu4.7 | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-66835 |
| Ubuntu:26.04:LTS | erlang | 1:27.3.4.6+dfsg-1ubuntu0.1 | USN-8827-1 |
| Ubuntu:26.04:LTS | erlang | 1:27.3.4.6+dfsg-1ubuntu0.1 | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-66835 |
Affected products (as reported)
Weakness: CWE-50 · Vector: CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:H/VI:N/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
References
- https://github.com/erlang/otp/security/advisories/GHSA-r4vv-vc2c-2fw6 vendor-advisory, related
- https://cna.erlef.org/cves/CVE-2026-66835.html related
- https://osv.dev/vulnerability/EEF-CVE-2026-66835 related
- https://www.erlang.org/doc/system/versions.html#order-of-versions x_version-scheme
- https://github.com/erlang/otp/commit/bac19eb3dbd96cc49b6d8cabc1c04248bf8c79f6 patch
- https://github.com/erlang/otp/commit/d8878dec0ececc2eab18e47bb18b472f224ca633 patch
- https://github.com/erlang/otp/commit/9641944a2efbf55bea760f8ff7ba777fe3a0961c patch