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Fencer Intel
high 7.5

CVE-2026-42440 json

Apache OpenNLP: OOM DoS via Unbounded Array Allocation in AbstractModelReader

published 6mo ago modified 5d ago also EUVD-2026-27031 , GHSA-659w-93r5-9j6m

cvss
7.5
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.6%
EPSS 0.6% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 49%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

OOM Denial of Service via Unbounded Array Allocation in Apache OpenNLP AbstractModelReader

Versions Affected:

before 1.9.5 before 2.5.9

before 3.0.0-M3

Description:

The AbstractModelReader methods getOutcomes(), getOutcomePatterns(), and getPredicates() each read a 32-bit signed integer count field from a binary model stream and pass that value directly to an array allocation (new String[numOutcomes], new int[numOCTypes][], new String[NUM_PREDS]) without validating that the value is non-negative or within a reasonable bound. The count is therefore fully attacker-controlled when the model file originates from an untrusted source.

A crafted .bin model file in which any of these count fields is set to Integer.MAX_VALUE (or any value large enough to exhaust the available heap) triggers an OutOfMemoryError at the array allocation itself, before the corresponding label or pattern data is consumed from the stream. The error occurs very early in deserialization: for a GIS model, getOutcomes() is reached after only the model-type string, the correction constant, and the correction parameter have been read; so the attacker pays no meaningful size cost to weaponize a payload, and a single small file can crash a JVM that loads it. Any code path that deserializes a .bin model is affected, including direct use of GenericModelReader and any higher-level component that delegates to it during model load.

The practical impact is denial of service against processes that load model files from untrusted or semi-trusted origins.

Mitigation:

* 2.x users should upgrade to 2.5.9.

* 3.x users should upgrade to 3.0.0-M3.

Note: The fix introduces an upper bound on each of the three count fields, checked before array allocation; counts that are negative or exceed the bound cause an IllegalArgumentException to be thrown and the read to fail fast with no large allocation. The default bound is 10,000,000, which is well above the entry counts of legitimate OpenNLP models but far below any value that would threaten heap exhaustion. Deployments that legitimately need to load models with more entries than the default can raise the limit at JVM startup by setting the OPENNLP_MAX_ENTRIES system property to the desired positive integer (e.g. -DOPENNLP_MAX_ENTRIES=50000000); invalid or non-positive values fall back to the default.

Users who cannot upgrade immediately should treat all .bin model files as untrusted input unless their provenance is verified, and should avoid loading models supplied by end users or fetched from third-party repositories without integrity checks.

Patch / fix

  • maven org.apache.opennlp:opennlp-tools 1.9.5, 2.5.9, 3.0.0-M3
  • Apache Software Foundation Apache OpenNLP 1.9.5, 2.5.9, 3.0.0-M3
  • apache-opennlp Debian 14 2.5.9-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2026-42440

  • opennlp openSUSE Tumbleweed 1.9.5-1.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2026:11281-1

Is CVE-2026-42440 in your dependencies? Fencer shows which of your repositories are affected as soon as an advisory lands, and opens the fix as a pull request.

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Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2026-42440 updated cvss 7.5

org.apache.opennlp/opennlp-tools: Apache OpenNLP: Denial of Service via unbounded array allocation in crafted model files

  • Red Hat Fuse 7 opennlp-tools, opennlp-maxent
    affected: workaround, no fix planned “Will not fix”
  • Red Hat Data Grid 8 opennlp-tools Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform Expansion Pack opennlp-tools
    not affected: component not present
  • Red Hat OpenShift AI (RHOAI) rhoai/odh-trustyai-service-rhel8, rhoai/odh-trustyai-service-rhel9, rhoai/odh-workbench-jupyter-trustyai-cpu-py312-rhel9
    not affected: vulnerable code not present

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

CISA SSVC

Exploitation
none
Automatable
yes
Technical impact
partial
Assessed
6mo ago

Exploit prediction

0.60% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 49% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CISA ADP 3.1 7.5 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
GitHub 3.1 7.5 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
CNA 3.1 7.5 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Affected packages

ecosystem package affected fixed in
maven org.apache.opennlp:opennlp-tools
>=2.0.0, <2.5.9
>=3.0.0-M1, <3.0.0-M3
<1.9.5
2.5.9
3.0.0-M3
1.9.5

Affected products

  • Apache Software Foundation Apache OpenNLP
  • Red Hat Red Hat Data Grid 8
  • Red Hat Red Hat Fuse 7
  • Red Hat Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform Expansion Pack
  • Red Hat Red Hat OpenShift AI (RHOAI)

Classification

Weakness
  • CWE-789 Memory Allocation with Excessive Size Value
  • CWE-770 Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling

References

Sources

Fencer Intel keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.

CPEs and fixed versions use Anchore's correction of NVD's data: Added CPE configurations because not yet analyzed by NVD.