Botan: Integer overflow when reporting block size in FFI can cause memory corruption

Botan is a C++ cryptography library. From 2.1.0 until 3.13.0, the Botan C API function botan_block_cipher_block_size converted a size_t block size to int without a bounds check. In an application that accepts external algorithm parameter strings and uses the FFI raw ECB mode, an attacker can select the variable-block-size Lion cipher so that the reported size is truncated, the caller allocates insufficient memory, and later block processing causes memory corruption. The C++ API and normally used C API modes such as CBC and CTR are unaffected. This issue is fixed in version 3.13.0.

Source published

29 Oct 2026 17:22:07 UTC

Source modified

29 Oct 2026 17:22:07 UTC

Observed here

29 Oct 2026 19:28:49 UTC

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CVSS 4.0 · 9.2 CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N