CVE-2026-75870

CVE-2026-75870

Punk versions before 0.18 for Perl allow session cookie forgery via an empty default HMAC key when a session is declared without a secret. The session keyword freezes its options onto the application as given: it does not require a secret, warn, or refuse to start when one is absent. The cookie read and the write-back both default that key to the empty string, so a declaration with no secret option, or with an undefined or empty one, signs and verifies with a zero-length HMAC-SHA256 key. An attacker who knows the cookie format can then mint one offline carrying any contents the session holds, such as a user identifier or a role. Nothing marks the misconfiguration at runtime: cookies are well formed and sessions round-trip as expected.

Published · last modified .

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 9.1 (Critical). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.005 (40.4th percentile), scored .

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 40th percentile — 40.4% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS trend (30 days)EPSS over the last 30 days for CVE-2026-75870: held from 0.005 to 0.005.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.005 · newest: 0.005 · change: +0.000

Weakness classification (CWE)

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2026-75870?
CVE-2026-75870 is a critical-severity vulnerability, classified under CWE-1394. CVSS score: 9.1/10. Published 2026-08-22.
How severe is CVE-2026-75870?
Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 9.1 out of 10.