CVE-2025-69419

Issue summary: Calling PKCS12_get_friendlyname() function on a maliciously crafted PKCS#12 file with a BMPString (UTF-16BE) friendly name containing non-ASCII BMP code point can trigger a one byte write before the allocated buffer.

Impact summary: The out-of-bounds write can cause a memory corruption which can have various consequences including a Denial of Service.

The OPENSSL_uni2utf8() function performs a two-pass conversion of a PKCS#12 BMPString (UTF-16BE) to UTF-8. In the second pass, when emitting UTF-8 bytes, the helper function bmp_to_utf8() incorrectly forwards the remaining UTF-16 source byte count as the destination buffer capacity to UTF8_putc(). For BMP code points above U+07FF, UTF-8 requires three bytes, but the forwarded capacity can be just two bytes. UTF8_putc() then returns -1, and this negative value is added to the output length without validation, causing the length to become negative. The subsequent trailing NUL byte is then written at a negative offset, causing write outside of heap allocated buffer.

The vulnerability is reachable via the public PKCS12_get_friendlyname() API when parsing attacker-controlled PKCS#12 files. While PKCS12_parse() uses a different code path that avoids this issue, PKCS12_get_friendlyname() directly invokes the vulnerable function. Exploitation requires an attacker to provide a malicious PKCS#12 file to be parsed by the application and the attacker can just trigger a one zero byte write before the allocated buffer. For that reason the issue was assessed as Low severity according to our Security Policy.

The FIPS modules in 3.6, 3.5, 3.4, 3.3 and 3.0 are not affected by this issue, as the PKCS#12 implementation is outside the OpenSSL FIPS module boundary.

OpenSSL 3.6, 3.5, 3.4, 3.3, 3.0 and 1.1.1 are vulnerable to this issue.

OpenSSL 1.0.2 is not affected by this issue.

Weakness

The product writes data past the end, or before the beginning, of the intended buffer.

Affected Software

Potential Mitigations

• Use a language that does not allow this weakness to occur or provides constructs that make this weakness easier to avoid.

• For example, many languages that perform their own memory management, such as Java and Perl, are not subject to buffer overflows. Other languages, such as Ada and C#, typically provide overflow protection, but the protection can be disabled by the programmer.

• Be wary that a language’s interface to native code may still be subject to overflows, even if the language itself is theoretically safe.

• Use a vetted library or framework that does not allow this weakness to occur or provides constructs that make this weakness easier to avoid.

• Examples include the Safe C String Library (SafeStr) by Messier and Viega [REF-57], and the Strsafe.h library from Microsoft [REF-56]. These libraries provide safer versions of overflow-prone string-handling functions.

• Use automatic buffer overflow detection mechanisms that are offered by certain compilers or compiler extensions. Examples include: the Microsoft Visual Studio /GS flag, Fedora/Red Hat FORTIFY_SOURCE GCC flag, StackGuard, and ProPolice, which provide various mechanisms including canary-based detection and range/index checking.

• D3-SFCV (Stack Frame Canary Validation) from D3FEND [REF-1334] discusses canary-based detection in detail.

• Consider adhering to the following rules when allocating and managing an application’s memory:

• Run or compile the software using features or extensions that randomly arrange the positions of a program’s executable and libraries in memory. Because this makes the addresses unpredictable, it can prevent an attacker from reliably jumping to exploitable code.

• Examples include Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR) [REF-58] [REF-60] and Position-Independent Executables (PIE) [REF-64]. Imported modules may be similarly realigned if their default memory addresses conflict with other modules, in a process known as “rebasing” (for Windows) and “prelinking” (for Linux) [REF-1332] using randomly generated addresses. ASLR for libraries cannot be used in conjunction with prelink since it would require relocating the libraries at run-time, defeating the whole purpose of prelinking.

• For more information on these techniques see D3-SAOR (Segment Address Offset Randomization) from D3FEND [REF-1335].

• Use a CPU and operating system that offers Data Execution Protection (using hardware NX or XD bits) or the equivalent techniques that simulate this feature in software, such as PaX [REF-60] [REF-61]. These techniques ensure that any instruction executed is exclusively at a memory address that is part of the code segment.

• For more information on these techniques see D3-PSEP (Process Segment Execution Prevention) from D3FEND [REF-1336].

References

• https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/41be0f216404f14457bbf3b9cc488dba60b49296
• https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/7e9cac9832e4705b91987c2474ed06a37a93cecb
• https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/a26a90d38edec3748566129d824e664b54bee2e2
• https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/cda12de3bc0e333ea8d2c6fd15001dbdaf280015
• https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/ff628933755075446bca8307e8417c14d164b535
• https://openssl-library.org/news/secadv/20260127.txt