Forge checks certificate signatures with the issuer's scheme
Key facts
- Attack vector
- Network
- Privileges required
- None
- User interaction
- None
- Attack complexity
- Low
- Impact type
- Security bypass
- Confidentiality · integrity · availability
- None · Low · None
- Fix status
- Partial Red Hat: 19 without a fix
Attack profile from CVSS 3.1 · NVD. Fix status from CNA and Red Hat. Impact type from CWE-347.
Summary
digitalbazaar forge (node-forge) before 1.4.1 is affected. When verifying a certificate, it selects RSA padding and RSASSA-PSS parameters from the issuer certificate instead of the child certificate, a flaw tied to CWE-347. A child certificate labeled RSASSA-PSS can therefore be accepted with a PKCS#1 v1.5 signature when the issuer uses PKCS#1 v1.5, so an unprivileged remote attacker can bypass policies that require a declared signature scheme. The signature must still come from the trusted issuer's key, so certificate identity cannot be forged, and a public exploit is linked in the references.
Written with Claude Haiku 5.5 from the sources below · 2026-11-07
Description from the CNA
Forge (also called node-forge) is a native implementation of Transport Layer Security in JavaScript. Prior to 1.4.1, the affected implementation used certificate.verify(child), _verifySignature(), lib/x509.js to process the relevant input or security decision. node-forge selected RSA padding and RSASSA-PSS parameters from the issuer certificate rather than the child certificate being verified. A child labeled as RSASSA-PSS could therefore be accepted with a PKCS#1 v1.5 signature when the issuer used PKCS#1 v1.5. The signature still had to be produced with the trusted issuer's private key, so this did not permit certificate identity forgery, but it could bypass policies that require a declared signature scheme. This issue is fixed in version 1.4.1.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| digitalbazaar | forge | before 1.4.1 | 1.4.1 | Patch available | CNA |
- forge Vendordigitalbazaar Affected before 1.4.1 Fixed in 1.4.1 Patch available CNA
CPE configurations NVD · 1
| CPE | Versions | Role | Vendor |
|---|---|---|---|
| cpe:2.3:a:digitalbazaar:forge:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* | before 1.4.1 | Vulnerable | digitalbazaar |
- cpe:2.3:a:digitalbazaar:forge:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:* Versions before 1.4.1 Vulnerable ·digitalbazaar
Remediation
Upgrade digitalbazaar forge to version 1.4.1, which contains the fix. Red Hat lists these products as affected without a fix, with Red Hat's plan: Node HealthCheck Operator (no fix planned), OpenShift Pipelines (none available), OpenShift Serverless (none available), OpenShift Service Mesh 3 (no fix planned), Red Hat AMQ Broker 7 (none available) and other products.
Written with Claude Haiku 5.5 from the sources below · 2026-11-07
- Fix · CNA forge (digitalbazaar) Fixed in 1.4.1
Vendor assessments
Red Hat
Red Hat rating: Low. Red Hat's page for this CVE →
| Product | Status | Plan or fix |
|---|---|---|
| Node HealthCheck Operator | Affected | No fix planned: Out of support scope |
| OpenShift Pipelines | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| OpenShift Serverless | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| OpenShift Service Mesh 3 | Affected | No fix planned: Out of support scope |
| Red Hat AMQ Broker 7 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform 2 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Build of Podman Desktop | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Ceph Storage 4 | Affected | No fix planned: Out of support scope |
| Red Hat Connectivity Link 1 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Developer Hub 1 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 | 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 Enterprise Linux AI (RHEL AI) 3 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Fuse 7 | Affected | No fix planned: Out of support scope |
| Red Hat OpenShift AI (RHOAI) | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Red Hat Quay 3 | Affected | No fix planned: Out of support scope |
| Red Hat build of Apache Camel for Spring Boot 4 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
| Self-service automation portal 2 | Affected | No fix yet: Fix deferred |
Not affected: 1 product
- Red Hat Hardened Images
Timeline
- 2026-10-29 Threatist record created from CVE-2026-118774
- 2026-11-03 CISA SSVC decision points changed
- 2026-11-04 CVSS score added · NVD
- 2026-11-07 Affected versions changed · Red Hat
- 2026-11-07 CVSS score added · Red Hat
References
More digitalbazaar Forge vulnerabilities
- TI-2026-26254 Forge has a basicConstraints bypass in its certificate chain verification (RFC 5280 violation) CVSS 3.1CRITICAL 9.1
- TI-2026-82739 ASN.1 resource exhaustion in Forge asn1.fromDer via BIT STRINGs CVSS 3.1HIGH 7.5
- TI-2026-82735 Denial of service in Forge TLS record processing via stack exhaustion CVSS 3.1HIGH 7.5
- TI-2026-26253 Forge has signature forgery in Ed25519 due to missing S > L check CVSS 3.1HIGH 7.5
- TI-2026-26252 Forge has signature forgery in RSA-PKCS due to ASN.1 extra field CVSS 3.1HIGH 7.5
- TI-2026-26249 Forge has Denial of Service via Infinite Loop in BigInteger.modInverse() with Zero Input CVSS 3.1HIGH 7.5
Sources
- CVE-2026-118774 · CVE Program
- CVE-2026-118774 · NVD
- FIRST EPSS
- CVE-2026-118774 · 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