Unauthenticated CRLF injection via post-validation percent-decoding
Published May 29, 2026 · Updated May 29, 2026
CRLF injection in cpp-httplib before 0.44.0 allows remote attackers to inject control bytes through encoded request headers. The server-side parse_header validates each field value before percent-decoding it, so %0D%0A becomes literal CRLF after validation. Unauthenticated network reachability is sufficient, but downstream impact requires application code to reflect, log, or proxy the decoded value, enabling response splitting, log injection, or request smuggling.
Summary
What happened
CRLF injection in cpp-httplib before 0.44.0 allows remote attackers to inject control bytes through encoded request headers. The server-side parse_header validates each field value before percent-decoding it, so %0D%0A becomes literal CRLF after validation. Unauthenticated network reachability is sufficient, but downstream impact requires application code to reflect, log, or proxy the decoded value, enabling response splitting, log injection, or request smuggling.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-45372
- Published
- May 29, 2026
- Updated
- May 29, 2026
- Vendor
- Yuji Hirose
- Product
- cpp-httplib
- Classifications
- CWE-444, CWE-93, T1190
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- unauthenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- May 29, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- May 29, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
Compare these published version ranges with your installed build and any vendor patches.
- Affected versionversion=< 0.44.0
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
CVSS describes severity. EPSS estimates exploitation probability.
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Weakness, pattern, technique
Public exploit references
- Upstream encoded-header proof of conceptproof of concept · demonstrated
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Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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