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Medium

OpenBao: Transit secrets engine crashes on key creation with `derived: true` for asymmetric key types

Type: advisorySources: OSV

OpenBao is an open source identity-based secrets management system. Prior to 2.5.5, an authenticated OpenBao caller with write access to transit/keys/* could terminate the server process by setting derived to true while the type parameter selected rsa-, ecdsa-, or ed25519. The Transit policy creation path in builtin/logical/transit/backend.go and sdk/helper/keysutil/policy.go could reach an error path that double-unlocked a mutex while handling this invalid asymmetric derived-key combination, causing a panic, no HTTP response, process exit, and denial of service. JSON and HCL key-creation requests can express the triggering combination. This issue is fixed in version 2.5.5.

Products
Not specified
Affected versions
Not specified
Fixed versions
Not specified
CVEs
CVE-2026-55776
Confirmed fixed CVEs
Not specified
Updated in this feed
2 Nov 2026, 20:06 UTC · Revision 1

Source evidence

OpenBao: Transit secrets engine crashes on key creation with `derived: true` for asymmetric key types

core-osv · Original source

Published 15 Sept 2026, 15:43 UTC

OpenBao is an open source identity-based secrets management system. Prior to 2.5.5, an authenticated OpenBao caller with write access to transit/keys/* could terminate the server process by setting derived to true while the type parameter selected rsa-, ecdsa-, or ed25519. The Transit policy creation path in builtin/logical/transit/backend.go and sdk/helper/keysutil/policy.go could reach an error path that double-unlocked a mutex while handling this invalid asymmetric derived-key combination, causing a panic, no HTTP response, process exit, and denial of service. JSON and HCL key-creation requests can express the triggering combination. This issue is fixed in version 2.5.5.

osv:CVE-2026-55776
Complete source record
{
  "id": "df0ae287e45fcca7fdb24fa1ef77e29e78f2026835c8f3dbb64b6fe27151f870",
  "url": "https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2026-55776",
  "method": "structured",
  "payload": {
    "kind": "advisory",
    "title": "OpenBao: Transit secrets engine crashes on key creation with `derived: true` for asymmetric key types",
    "summary": "OpenBao is an open source identity-based secrets management system. Prior to 2.5.5, an authenticated OpenBao caller with write access to transit/keys/* could terminate the server process by setting derived to true while the type parameter selected rsa-, ecdsa-, or ed25519. The Transit policy creation path in builtin/logical/transit/backend.go and sdk/helper/keysutil/policy.go could reach an error path that double-unlocked a mutex while handling this invalid asymmetric derived-key combination, causing a panic, no HTTP response, process exit, and denial of service. JSON and HCL key-creation requests can express the triggering combination. This issue is fixed in version 2.5.5.",
    "evidence": "osv:CVE-2026-55776",
    "products": [],
    "severity": "medium",
    "structured": {
      "id": "CVE-2026-55776",
      "aliases": [
        "BIT-openbao-2026-55776",
        "CVE-2026-55776",
        "GHSA-8w8f-r2xv-4q4j",
        "GO-2026-5267"
      ],
      "metrics": [
        {
          "type": "CVSS_V3",
          "score": "CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H"
        }
      ],
      "affected": [
        {
          "ranges": [
            {
              "repo": "https://github.com/openbao/openbao",
              "type": "GIT",
              "events": [
                {
                  "introduced": "0"
                },
                {
                  "fixed": "028992583c693c4de6350b8aa52ff85e30375a99"
                },
                {
                  "fixed": "bb17827f3e33779a10166f7d0e61b191c0facef9"
                },
                {
                  "fixed": "db57c62602b25da12951f3f0edb888e7c4da61e5"
                },
                {
                  "fixed": "03e3a243b6f07d17c60ce0a182adee7cf4c424eb"
                }
              ],
              "database_specific": {
                "extracted_events": [
                  {
                    "range": [
                      {
                        "introduced": "0"
                      },
                      {
                        "fixed": "2.5.5"
                      }
                    ],
                    "source": "AFFECTED_FIELD",
                    "strategy": "StringRangeExpression"
                  },
                  {
                    "range": [
                      {
                        "fixed": "bb17827f3e33779a10166f7d0e61b191c0facef9"
                      }
                    ],
                    "source": "REFERENCES_COMMIT"
                  },
                  {
                    "range": [
                      {
                        "fixed": "db57c62602b25da12951f3f0edb888e7c4da61e5"
                      }
                    ],
                    "source": "REFERENCES_COMMIT"
                  },
                  {
                    "range": [
                      {
                        "fixed": "028992583c693c4de6350b8aa52ff85e30375a99"
                      }
                    ],
                    "source": "REFERENCES_TAG",
                    "original_tag": "v2.5.5"
                  },
                  {
                    "range": [
                      {
                        "fixed": "03e3a243b6f07d17c60ce0a182adee7cf4c424eb"
                      }
                    ],
                    "source": "REFERENCES_TAG",
                    "original_tag": "v2.6.0"
                  }
                ]
              }
            }
          ],
          "versions": [
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            "api/auth/approle/v2.5.1",
            "v2.5.0-beta20251125",
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            "api/auth/ldap/v2.5.0",
            "api/auth/kubernetes/v2.5.0",
            "api/auth/jwt/v2.5.0",
            "api/auth/approle/v2.5.0",
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            "api/auth/ldap/v1.1.0-development20240408",
            "api/auth/kubernetes/v1.1.0-development20240408",
            "api/auth/gcp/v1.1.0-development20240408",
            "api/auth/azure/v1.1.0-development20240408",
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            "api/auth/approle/v1.1.0-development20240408",
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          ],
          "database_specific": {
            "source": "https://storage.googleapis.com/cve-osv-conversion/osv-output/CVE-2026-55776.json"
          }
        }
      ],
      "modified": "2026-10-28T02:30:23.295406763Z",
      "provider": "osv",
      "references": [
        "https://github.com/openbao/openbao/releases/tag/v2.5.5",
        "https://github.com/openbao/openbao/releases/tag/v2.6.0",
        "https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/tree/main/cves/2026/55xxx/CVE-2026-55776.json",
        "https://github.com/openbao/openbao/security/advisories/GHSA-8w8f-r2xv-4q4j",
        "https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2026-55776",
        "https://github.com/openbao/openbao/commit/bb17827f3e33779a10166f7d0e61b191c0facef9",
        "https://github.com/openbao/openbao/commit/db57c62602b25da12951f3f0edb888e7c4da61e5",
        "https://github.com/openbao/openbao/pull/3309",
        "https://github.com/openbao/openbao/pull/3312"
      ],
      "provider_metadata": {
        "cwe_ids": [
          "CWE-617"
        ],
        "cna_assigner": "GitHub_M",
        "osv_generated_from": "https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/tree/main/cves/2026/55xxx/CVE-2026-55776.json"
      }
    },
    "related_cves": [
      {
        "value": "CVE-2026-55776",
        "evidence": "/id"
      }
    ],
    "security_relevant": true,
    "severity_evidence": "/severity/0/score"
  },
  "source_id": "core-osv",
  "document_id": 489634,
  "published_at": "2026-09-15T15:43:29.564+00:00"
}