CVE-2026-1757VulnerabilityPublished 2 Feb 2026Updated 1 Sep 2026

CVE-2026-1757: Red Hat Hardened Images · Memory Leak

Affects Red Hat Hardened ImagesSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 6.2 Medium.

Data as of 25 Oct 2026, 19:02 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

6.2Medium

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 12% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Attack Vector: Local
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: None
Integrity: None
Availability: High

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Local: The vulnerable component is not bound to the network stack and the attacker’s path is via read/write/execute capabilities. Either: the attacker exploits the vulnerability by accessing the target system locally (e.g., keyboard, console), or remotely (e.g., SSH); or the attacker relies on User Interaction by another person to perform actions required to exploit the vulnerability (e.g., tricking a legitimate user into opening a malicious document).
Attack Complexity: Low: Specialized access conditions or extenuating circumstances do not exist. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable component.
Privileges Required: None: The attacker is unauthorized prior to attack, and therefore does not require any access to settings or files to carry out an attack.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without any interaction from any user.
Scope: Unchanged: An exploited vulnerability can only affect resources managed by the same security authority. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are either the same, or both are managed by the same security authority.
Confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the impacted component.
Integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the impacted component.
Availability: High: There is total loss of availability, resulting in the attacker being able to fully deny access to resources in the impacted component; this loss is either sustained (while the attacker continues to deliver the attack) or persistent (the condition persists even after the attack has completed). Alternatively, the attacker has the ability to deny some availability, but the loss of availability presents a direct, serious consequence to the impacted component (e.g., the attacker cannot disrupt existing connections, but can prevent new connections; the attacker can repeatedly exploit a vulnerability that, in each instance of a successful attack, leaks a only small amount of memory, but after repeated exploitation causes a service to become completely unavailable).

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 2 Feb 2026
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by 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 2026-10-25.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

cwe-401

What to do

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
Red HatRed Hat Hardened Images	Affected–	Fixed in–
Red HatRed Hat Enterprise Linux 10	Affected–	Fixed in–
Red HatRed Hat Enterprise Linux 6	Affected–	Fixed in–
Red HatRed Hat Enterprise Linux 7	Affected–	Fixed in–
Red HatRed Hat Enterprise Linux 8	Affected–	Fixed in–
Red HatRed Hat Enterprise Linux 9	Affected–	Fixed in–
Red HatRed Hat JBoss Core Services	Affected–	Fixed in–
Red HatRed Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4	Affected–	Fixed in–

AI-suggested

Red Hat has released updated libxml2 RPM packages that address this memory leak issue. Users of Red Hat Hardened Images should apply the libxml2 package updates (libxml2-16-2.15.2-0.3.hum1 and related packages) as provided in Red Hat Advisory RHSA-2026:7519. Patch status is confirmed by the vendor advisory. No additional mitigation is indicated.

Description

A flaw was identified in the interactive shell of the xmllint utility, part of the libxml2 project, where memory allocated for user input is not properly released under certain conditions. When a user submits input consisting only of whitespace, the program skips command execution but fails to free the allocated buffer. Repeating this action causes memory to continuously accumulate. Over time, this can exhaust system memory and terminate the xmllint process, creating a denial-of-service condition on the local system.

Impact

The vulnerability leads to a denial-of-service condition on the local system by exhausting memory through a memory leak in the xmllint interactive shell. There is no impact on confidentiality or integrity. The process termination affects availability of the xmllint utility and potentially dependent services or scripts.

Summary

This vulnerability in the xmllint utility, part of the libxml2 project included in Red Hat Hardened Images, occurs because memory allocated for user input is not released when the input is only whitespace. Repeatedly submitting whitespace input causes memory to accumulate, eventually exhausting system memory and terminating the xmllint process, resulting in a denial-of-service condition. The CVSS 3.1 score is 6.2 (medium severity) with vector AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H, indicating local attack vector, low complexity, no privileges or user interaction required, and impact limited to availability. Red Hat has published updated libxml2 packages (version 2.15.2-0.3.hum1) that include fixes for this issue.

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 24 Apr 2026, 15:54 UTC

Technical details

References

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