OCSP_basic_verify may incorrectly verify the response signing certificate

The function `OCSP_basic_verify` verifies the signer certificate on an OCSP response. In the case where the (non-default) flag OCSP_NOCHECKS is used then the response will be positive (meaning a successful verification) even in the case where the response signing certificate fails to verify. It is anticipated that most users of `OCSP_basic_verify` will not use the OCSP_NOCHECKS flag. In this case the `OCSP_basic_verify` function will return a negative value (indicating a fatal error) in the case of a certificate verification failure. The normal expected return value in this case would be 0. This issue also impacts the command line OpenSSL "ocsp" application. When verifying an ocsp response with the "-no_cert_checks" option the command line application will report that the verification is successful even though it has in fact failed. In this case the incorrect successful response will also be accompanied by error messages showing the failure and contradicting the apparently successful result. Fixed in OpenSSL 3.0.3 (Affected 3.0.0,3.0.1,3.0.2).

Source published

3 May 2022 15:15:21 UTC

Source modified

14 Oct 2026 12:43:58 UTC

Observed here

23 Oct 2026 15:48:27 UTC

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