# CVE-2026-55588: ORAS CLI: Cyclic Referrer Graph Can Cause Unbounded Recursion and Resource Consumption

> A malicious OCI registry can cause unbounded recursion and resource exhaustion in ORAS CLI, leading to client-side denial of service.

- **Severity:** Medium 6.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** A user has to click or open something
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 25 Aug 2026
- **Updated:** 27 Aug 2026
- **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2026-55588, GHSA-298f-872v-2rcx, GO-2026-6317, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-55588

## What is CVE-2026-55588?

CVE-2026-55588 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in oras-project oras, published on 25 Aug 2026. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.

### Official description

ORAS (OCI Registry As Storage) is a CLI and library for managing artifacts in OCI registries. In ORAS CLI versions up to and including 1.3.2, the recursive referrer traversal does not track visited descriptors, so a malicious OCI registry that returns a cyclic referrer graph causes unbounded recursion and memory growth. This affects oras discover, whose recursive traversal is enabled by default because the --depth option defaults to 0 (unlimited), as well as the recursive referrer counting used by the oras backup and oras restore workflows. A cyclic graph can be as simple as A referring to B and B referring back to A. A malicious registry can use this to cause a client-side denial of service, exhausting CPU and memory and hanging automation or CI/CD pipelines that run ORAS against untrusted registry metadata. The vulnerability does not extend to code execution, artifact substitution, or integrity bypass. This issue has been fixed in version 1.3.3.

Weakness: CWE-835 (Loop with Unreachable Exit Condition), CWE-674 (Uncontrolled Recursion), CWE-400 (Uncontrolled Resource Consumption)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-55588?

3 open source packages ship an affected version, including oras.land/oras.


| Package | Ecosystem | Affected | Fixed in |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `oras.land/oras` | Go | All versions | 1.3.3 |
| `oras.land/oras` | Go | All versions | 1.3.3 |
| `oras.land/oras` | Go | All versions | 1.3.3 |

## How do I fix CVE-2026-55588?

Upgrade oras.land/oras to 1.3.3 or later.

## Is CVE-2026-55588 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-55588 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2026-55588 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2026-55588 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in oras-project oras, published on 25 Aug 2026. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-55588 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected packages and fixed versions:
- oras.land/oras (Go): affected all versions; fixed in 1.3.3
- oras.land/oras (Go): affected all versions; fixed in 1.3.3
- oras.land/oras (Go): affected all versions; fixed in 1.3.3

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-2026-55588/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-55588/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-55588
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-55588
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2026-55588

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-55588/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.