Elliptic Cryptanalysis vulnerability when `k` has leading zeros
Key facts
- Attack vector
- Network
- Privileges required
- None
- User interaction
- None
- Attack complexity
- High
- Impact type
- —
- Confidentiality · integrity · availability
- Low · Low · Low
- Fix status
- Deferred Red Hat: fix deferred
Attack profile from CVSS 3.1 · CNA. Fix status from CNA, GitHub and Red Hat.
Summary
The ECDSA implementation of the Elliptic package generates incorrect signatures if an interim value of 'k' (as computed based on step 3.2 of RFC 6979 https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc6979 ) has leading zeros and is susceptible to cryptanalysis, which can lead to secret key exposure. This happens, because the byte-length of 'k' is incorrectly computed, resulting in its getting truncated during the computation. Legitimate transactions or communications will be broken as a result. Furthermore, due to the nature of the fault, attackers could–under certain conditions–derive the secret key, if they could get their hands on both a faulty signature generated by a vulnerable version of Elliptic and a correct signature for the same inputs. This issue affects all known versions of Elliptic (at the time of writing, versions less than or equal to 6.6.1).
Why it matters now
SSVC decision points
CISA ADP · SSVC 2.0.3
- Exploitation
- None
- Automatable
- No
- Technical impact
- Partial
The decision (Track, Attend, Act) also depends on your mission and well-being impact; see CISA's SSVC guide.
Affected products
| Vendor | Product | Affected versions | Fixed in | Status | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| N/A | Elliptic | up to 6.6.1 | — | No fix listed | CNA |
| — | elliptic (npm) | up to 6.6.1 | — | No fix listed | GHSA-848j-6mx2-7j84 |
- Elliptic VendorN/A Affected up to 6.6.1 Fixed in — No fix listed CNA
- elliptic (npm) Vendor— Affected up to 6.6.1 Fixed in — No fix listed GHSA-848j-6mx2-7j84
Remediation
No fixed version listed by the sources yet.
Vendor assessments
Red Hat
Red Hat rating: Moderate. Red Hat's page for this CVE →
| Product | Status | Plan or fix |
|---|---|---|
| Logging Subsystem for Red Hat OpenShift | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat 3scale API Management Platform 2 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Fuse 7 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat OpenShift AI (RHOAI) | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat OpenShift Dev Spaces | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Process Automation 7 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Quay 3 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat build of Apicurio Registry 2 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| streams for Apache Kafka 2 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| streams for Apache Kafka 3 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
Timeline
- 2026-10-02 Threatist record created from CVE-2025-14505
- 2026-10-03 Alias added: GHSA-848j-6mx2-7j84
References
Sources
- CVE-2025-14505 · CVE Program
- CVE-2025-14505 · NVD
- FIRST EPSS
- GHSA-848j-6mx2-7j84 · GitHub Advisory Database · CC BY 4.0
- CVE-2025-14505 · Red Hat security data · CC BY 4.0
This product uses the NVD API but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD. Sources and licences