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VulnerabilityPublished Updated

CVE-2025-48886: cardano-scaling hydra · Improper Handling of Exceptional Conditions

Affects cardano-scaling hydraSource CVE Database V5

0

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 4.8 Medium : upgrade to 0.22.0 when convenient.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 14:05 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score
4.8Medium
How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.
EPSS
0.3% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 23% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.
Patch
Available – fixed in 0.22.0
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N

Exploitation evidence

  1. Disclosed: evidence found.

    CVE published 19 Jun 2025

  2. Detectable: no evidence on record.

    No public nuclei template indexed

  3. Weaponised: no evidence on record.

    No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB

  4. Exploited in the wild: no evidence on record.

    Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation

  5. Observed by OffSeq Mirage: no evidence on record.

    No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 26 Oct 2026.

What to do

Upgrade cardano-scaling/hydra to 0.22.0.

Affected software

ProductAffectedFixed in
GitHubcardano-scaling/hydrapkg:github/cardano-scaling/hydraOther threatsAffected
  • <0.22.0
Fixed in
  • 0.22.0

Check your own hosts for these packages with threat-finder (opens in a new tab), our free open-source scanner.

AI-suggested

European organizations should promptly upgrade Hydra to version 0.22.0 or later, where this vulnerability is patched. Beyond upgrading, operators should implement enhanced monitoring of blockchain event finality and transaction statuses, incorporating additional verification steps to detect and handle failed transactions explicitly. Integrating fallback mechanisms to verify transaction finality beyond participant recognition can reduce susceptibility to re-org attacks. Organizations should also conduct thorough audits of their off-chain state management logic to ensure resilience against blockchain reorganizations. Deploying anomaly detection systems to identify unusual transaction rollbacks or state inconsistencies can provide early warning signs of exploitation attempts. Additionally, educating users and administrators about the need for cautious interaction with transaction confirmation prompts can mitigate risks associated with required user interaction. For critical infrastructure, implementing multi-signature or consensus-based validation for state progression events can further enhance integrity assurance.

Description

Hydra is a layer-two scalability solution for Cardano. Prior to version 0.22.0, the process assumes L1 event finality and does not consider failed transactions. Currently, Cardano L1 is monitored for certain events which are necessary for state progression. At the moment, Hydra considers those events as finalized as soon as they are recognized by the node participants making such transactions the target of re-org attacks. The system does not currently consider the fact that failed transactions on the Cardano L1 can indeed appear in blocks because these transactions are so infrequent. This issue has been patched in version 0.22.0.

References

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