nimiq-primitives: Panic DoS in trie chunk processing via ROOT-keyed item

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-2026-46545: 0.34% estimated exploitation activity in the next 30 days; percentile 27.39 (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.

Impact A remote, unauthenticated denial-of-service vulnerability in MerkleRadixTrie::putchunk allows any state-sync peer to crash any node performing state synchronization (freshly joining nodes and recovering nodes). A malicious peer can respond to a RequestChunk with a ResponseChunk::Chunk whose first TrieItem.key is the empty (ROOT) key. The chunk passes sorting, range, and Merkle-proof validation, but when putraw tries to store a value at the root node, it calls TrieNode::putvalue(...).unwrap(), which returns Err(RootCantHaveValue) and panics, aborting the node process. The panic fires on the first malicious chunk the victim commits; no rate limit or authentication gate caps the attack. Impacted: any node running state sync against untrusted peers — this includes fresh nodes performing initial download and existing nodes recovering from data loss. Honest nodes never construct ROOT-keyed items, so non-syncing operation is unaffected. Patches See PR. Workarounds There is no safe…

Published by the source

21 May 2026, 19:50 UTC

Last modified by the source

10 Jun 2026, 13:41 UTC

Source last checked

26 Oct 2026, 15:42 UTC

1. Revision 1 · created · 26 Oct 2026

   Published from ghsa record GHSA-mw3q-r9wh-h2ff

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# Patch Next advisory brief: CVE-2026-46545

Advisory: nimiq-primitives: Panic DoS in trie chunk processing via ROOT-keyed item
IDs: CVE-2026-46545, GHSA-mw3q-r9wh-h2ff
Record: https://patchnext.com/advisories/cve-2026-46545 (revision 1, source checked 26 Oct 2026, 15:42 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: nimiq-primitives 1.5.0. A vendor fix does not mean a deployment is fixed.

## Affected components
- crates.io nimiq-primitives: affected < 1.5.0; fixed in 1.5.0

## Suggested inspection (read-only)
- crates.io nimiq-primitives: 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 nimiq-primitives.
- 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-mw3q-r9wh-h2ff (GitHub-reviewed advisory GHSA-mw3q-r9wh-h2ff lists affected ranges: crates.io nimiq-primitives >=0 <1.5.0)

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