Resource leakage when decoding certificates and keys

Exploitation

No confirmed exploitation recorded. Patch Next marks exploitation only from CISA KEV.

CVSS

7.5 · CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

EPSS

• CVE-2022-1473: 4.68% estimated exploitation activity in the next 30 days; percentile 91.79 (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-03). This is a model estimate, not proof of exploitation or customer exposure.

As published by the source; long descriptions are shortened.

The OPENSSLLHflush() function, which empties a hash table, contains a bug that breaks reuse of the memory occuppied by the removed hash table entries. This function is used when decoding certificates or keys. If a long lived process periodically decodes certificates or keys its memory usage will expand without bounds and the process might be terminated by the operating system causing a denial of service. Also traversing the empty hash table entries will take increasingly more time. Typically such long lived processes might be TLS clients or TLS servers configured to accept client certificate authentication. The function was added in the OpenSSL 3.0 version thus older releases are not affected by the issue. Fixed in OpenSSL 3.0.3 (Affected 3.0.0,3.0.1,3.0.2).

Published by the source

4 May 2022, 00:00 UTC

Last modified by the source

17 Aug 2023, 05:02 UTC

Source last checked

26 Oct 2026, 15:37 UTC

1. Revision 1 · created · 26 Oct 2026

   Published from ghsa record GHSA-g323-fr93-4j3c

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# Patch Next advisory brief: CVE-2022-1473

Advisory: Resource leakage when decoding certificates and keys
IDs: CVE-2022-1473, GHSA-g323-fr93-4j3c
Record: https://patchnext.com/advisories/cve-2022-1473 (revision 1, source checked 26 Oct 2026, 15:37 UTC)
Inventory: none attached. This brief comes from a public page and does not say whether any deployment is affected.
Severity: High (CVSS 7.5)
Exploitation: no confirmed exploitation recorded. Patch Next confirms exploitation only from CISA KEV.
Vendor response: Vendor fix available; fixed versions by package: openssl-src 300.0.6. A vendor fix does not mean a deployment is fixed.

## Affected components
- crates.io openssl-src: affected >= 300.0.0, < 300.0.6; fixed in 300.0.6

## Suggested inspection (read-only)
- crates.io openssl-src: check the installed version with your package manager.

## Supported action
Upgrade each affected component to a fixed version on its release line. For a transitive dependency, upgrade the parent package or add an override or constraint, then regenerate the lockfile. Redeploy every environment that ran an affected version.

## Required regression checks
- Run the test suite and a production build.
- Exercise the features that depend on openssl-src.
- Repeat the inspection and confirm that only fixed versions remain installed.

## Rollback considerations
- Keep the previous lockfile and deployment artifact. Rolling back reinstates the vulnerable version, so apply any documented mitigation while you fix forward.

## Unresolved questions
- Which deployments run an affected version?
- Exploitation status can change. Check again before lowering the priority.
- Mark the work resolved only after the fixed version is verified in production.

## Sources
- Verified: https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-g323-fr93-4j3c (GitHub-reviewed advisory GHSA-g323-fr93-4j3c lists affected ranges: crates.io openssl-src >=300.0.0 <300.0.6)

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