CVE-2026-79896 Fortra BoKS Manager boks_portmux TLS ClientHello out-of-bounds read vulnerability
Remote unauthenticated attackers can crash the boks_portmux daemon via malformed TLS ClientHello packets, causing sustained service interruption.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- Not needed
- Attackable
- Over the internet
- Victim action needed
- Not needed
- Fix
- None listed
What is CVE-2026-79896?
CVE-2026-79896 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in Fortra BoKS Manager, published on 1 Oct 2026. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.
Official description
Fortra BoKS Manager contains an out-of-bounds read vulnerability in the custom TLS ClientHello parser used by boks_portmux. A remote unauthenticated attacker can submit a malformed ClientHello and terminate boks_portmux. Although the daemon is normally restarted automatically, repeated requests can sustain the service interruption.
Weakness: CWE-125
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-79896?
How do I fix CVE-2026-79896?
No fix has been published for CVE-2026-79896 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.
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-2026-79896 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-79896 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as GHSA-h5vq-j79p-4xf3.