CVE-2026-46545

Workarounds

There is no safe in-process workaround: any peer serving state-sync data can trigger the crash and the code path is not guarded by a feature flag.

Resources

• Fix commit: (link to the merged PR commit, once merged)
• Affected code: primitives/trie/src/trie.rs, put_chunk (around line 819) and put_raw (around line 351)

A remote, unauthenticated denial-of-service vulnerability in MerkleRadixTrie::put_chunk allows any state-sync peer to crash any node performing state synchronization (freshly joining nodes and recovering nodes).

A malicious peer can respond to a RequestChunk with a ResponseChunk::Chunk whose first TrieItem.key is the empty (ROOT) key. The chunk passes sorting, range, and Merkle-proof validation, but when put_raw tries to store a value at the root node, it calls TrieNode::put_value(...).unwrap(), which returns Err(RootCantHaveValue) and panics, aborting the node process. The panic fires on the first malicious chunk the victim commits; no rate limit or authentication gate caps the attack.

Impacted: any node running state sync against untrusted peers, this includes fresh nodes performing initial download and existing nodes recovering from data loss. Honest nodes never construct ROOT-keyed items, so non-syncing operation is unaffected.

CVE-2026-46545 has a CVSS score of 7.5 (High). The vector is network-reachable, no privileges required, and no user interaction. A CVSS score reflects the worst-case severity of the vulnerability, not your specific exposure. Whether this affects your application depends on whether the vulnerable code is present and reachable in your environment. A fixed version is available (1.5.0); upgrading removes the vulnerable code path.

Kodem intelligence

See PR.

1. What is CVE-2026-46545? CVE-2026-46545 is a high-severity security vulnerability in nimiq-primitives (rust), affecting versions < 1.5.0. It is fixed in 1.5.0.
2. How severe is CVE-2026-46545? CVE-2026-46545 has a CVSS score of 7.5 (High). This score reflects the worst-case severity of the vulnerability, not your specific exposure. Whether it represents real risk in your environment depends on whether the vulnerable code is present and reachable.
3. Which versions of nimiq-primitives are affected by CVE-2026-46545? nimiq-primitives (rust) versions < 1.5.0 is affected.
4. Is there a fix for CVE-2026-46545? Yes. CVE-2026-46545 is fixed in 1.5.0. Upgrade to this version or later.
5. Is CVE-2026-46545 exploitable, and should I be worried? Whether CVE-2026-46545 is exploitable in your environment depends on whether the vulnerable code is present and reachable. A CVSS score is a worst-case rating; it does not account for your specific deployment, configuration, or usage patterns. Kodem, an Intelligent Application Security platform, uses runtime intelligence to show which vulnerabilities actually execute in production, so you can focus on the ones that represent real risk. Get a demo
6. What actually determines whether CVE-2026-46545 is exploitable, and how bad it is? Exploitability and impact are not fixed properties of a CVE. They depend on runtime truth: whether the vulnerable code is present, reachable, and actually executes in your application. A high CVSS score on a dependency that never runs is not the same as real risk. Kodem, an Intelligent Application Security platform, uses runtime intelligence to reveal which vulnerabilities actually execute in production, so teams prioritize the ones that genuinely matter.
7. How do I fix CVE-2026-46545? Upgrade nimiq-primitives to 1.5.0 or later.