# CVE-2025-52986: Junos OS and Junos OS Evolved: When RIB sharding is configured each time a show command is executed RPD memory leaks

> A local low-privileged user can cause a denial of service by triggering memory leaks in the routing daemon when RIB sharding is enabled.

- **Severity:** Medium 6.8 (`CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:L/AU:Y/R:A/RE:M`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 11 Jul 2025
- **Updated:** 15 Jul 2025
- **Also known as:** GHSA-mfrf-wpm5-gv78

## What is CVE-2025-52986?

CVE-2025-52986 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Juniper Junos, published on 11 Jul 2025. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

A Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime vulnerability in the routing protocol daemon (rpd) of Juniper Networks Junos OS and Junos OS Evolved allows a local, low privileged user to cause an impact to the availability of the device.

When RIB sharding is enabled and a user executes one of several routing related 'show' commands, a certain amount of memory is leaked. When all available memory has been consumed rpd will crash and restart.

The leak can be monitored with the CLI command:

show task memory detail | match task_shard_mgmt_cookie

where the allocated memory in bytes can be seen to continuously increase with each exploitation.

This issue affects:

Junos OS:

  *  all versions before 21.2R3-S9,
  *  21.4 versions before 21.4R3-S11,
  *  22.2 versions before 22.2R3-S7,
  *  22.4 versions before 22.4R3-S7,
  *  23.2 versions before 23.2R2-S4, 
  *  23.4 versions before 23.4R2-S4,
  *  24.2 versions before 24.2R2,
  *  24.4 versions before 24.4R1-S2, 24.4R2;

Junos OS Evolved:

  *  all versions before 22.2R3-S7-EVO
  *  22.4-EVO versions before 22.4R3-S7-EVO,
  *  23.2-EVO versions before 23.2R2-S4-EVO,
  *  23.4-EVO versions before 23.4R2-S4-EVO,
  *  24.2-EVO versions before 24.2R2-EVO, 
  *  24.4-EVO versions before 24.4R2-EVO.

Weakness: CWE-401 (Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-52986?

It affects 2 products.


Products: Juniper Junos, Juniper Junos Os Evolved.

## How do I fix CVE-2025-52986?

No fix has been published for CVE-2025-52986 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2025-52986 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-52986 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Juniper Junos

- [CVE-2023-36845](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-36845/): Juniper Junos OS EX Series and SRX Series PHP External Variable Modification (critical 9.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2020-1631](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2020-1631/): Juniper Junos OS Path Traversal (high 8.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2025-21590](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-21590/): Juniper Junos OS Improper Isolation or Compartmentalization (medium 6.7, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2023-36851](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-36851/): Juniper Junos OS SRX Series Missing Authentication for Critical Function (medium 5.3, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2023-36844](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-36844/): Juniper Junos OS EX Series PHP External Variable Modification (medium 5.3, exploited in the wild)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2025-52986 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2025-52986 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Juniper Junos, published on 11 Jul 2025. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-52986 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Juniper Junos. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-52986/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-52986/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2025-52986
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2025-52986
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2025-52986

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-52986/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.