CVE-2026-33281 Ella Core panics on invalid PDU Session IDs in NGAP messages

What is CVE-2026-33281?

CVE-2026-33281 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in ellanetworks core, published on 23 Mar 2026. Any signed-in user can exploit it over the network, with no action from the victim.

Official description

Ella Core is a 5G core designed for private networks. Versions prior to 1.6.0 panic when processing NGAP messages with invalid PDU Session IDs outside of 1-15. An attacker able to send crafted NGAP messages to Ella Core can crash the process, causing service disruption for all connected subscribers. No authentication is required. Version 1.6.0 added PDU Session ID validations during NGAP message handling.

Weakness: CWE-129

Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-33281?

3 open source packages ship an affected version, including github.com/ellanetworks/core. It affects 1 product.

Products include Ellanetworks Ella Core.

How do I fix CVE-2026-33281?

Upgrade github.com/ellanetworks/core to 1.6.0 or later.

Upgrade, then put limits on request size, rate and nesting depth so one client cannot exhaust the service. More about Denial of service.

Is CVE-2026-33281 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-33281 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Other vulnerabilities in ellanetworks core

• CVE-2026-33282 Ella Core panics on malformed NGAP Location Report High 7.5
• CVE-2026-32319 Ella Core: Unauthenticated AMF DoS via malformed InitialUEMessage with undersized integrity-protected NAS payload High 7.5
• CVE-2026-33906 Ella Core has Privilege Escalation via Database Restore by NetworkManager role High 7.2
• CVE-2026-33903 Ella Core panics when processing a crafted NGAP LocationReport message Medium 6.5
• CVE-2026-33904 Ella Core has a Denial of Service via SCTP connection cleanup deadlock Medium 6.5

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as GHSA-q669-4gmv-g8mf, GO-2026-4783.