CVE-2026-54890: Erlang OTP · Integer Underflow (Wrap or Wraparound)
Affects Erlang OTPSource CVE Database V5
Not known to be exploited · CVSS 8.2 High : upgrade to dc1bf9344c0ce62717cf60866590cea0242780fd soon.
Data as of 25 Oct 2026, 19:02 UTC
- EPSS
- 0.4% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 36% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.
- Patch
- Available – fixed in dc1bf9344c0ce62717cf60866590cea0242780fd, 15.2.7.11, 27.3.4.15
CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:NExploitation evidence
Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 27 Jul 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.
What to do
Upgrade OTP to dc1bf9344c0ce62717cf60866590cea0242780fd; erts to 15.2.7.11; erlang/otp to 27.3.4.15.
Affected software
| Product | Affected | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
| ErlangOTP | Affected
| Fixed in– |
| ErlangOTP | Affected
| Fixed in
|
GitHubertspkg:github/ertsOther threats | Affected
| Fixed in
|
GitHuberlang/otppkg:github/erlang/otpOther threats | Affected
| Fixed in
|
CPE configurations (1)
cpe:2.3:a:erlang:erlang\/otp:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
Check your own hosts for these packages with threat-finder (opens in a new tab), our free open-source scanner.
AI-suggested
If you cannot patch yet, avoid decoding ETF data from untrusted sources using binary_to_term/1,2 or enif_binary_to_term(). The Erlang distribution protocol is not considered vulnerable in typical trusted network deployments. No mitigation via the safe option in binary_to_term/2 is effective against this issue.
Description
Integer Underflow (Wrap or Wraparound) vulnerability in erlang otp erlang/otp (erts modules), erlang otp erts (erts modules) allows Forced Integer Overflow, Excessive Allocation. This vulnerability is associated with program files erts/emulator/beam/external.c, emulator/beam/external.c. The BIT_BINARY_EXT tag (77) handler in the External Term Format (ETF) decoder accepts an encoding with both length and trailing-bits fields set to zero. The subsequent computation of the bitstring size underflows an unsigned integer, producing a value of roughly 2^64 that is then passed as a memory allocation size. The allocator aborts the entire node with a message such as "Cannot allocate 2305843009213693951 bytes of memory (of type binary)". The crash is a VM-level abort, not an Erlang-level exception. It cannot be intercepted by supervision trees, by try/catch, or by passing the [safe] option to binary_to_term/2 (which only restricts atom creation and does not perform structural validation of binary encodings). Any application that decodes ETF from untrusted sources via binary_to_term/1,2 or enif_binary_to_term() is exposed. The Erlang distribution protocol also decodes incoming terms through the same code path, but distribution is expected to run on trusted networks per the OTP Secure Coding Guidelines (DSG-011). This issue affects OTP from OTP 27.0 before OTP 29.0.4, OTP 28.5.0.4 and OTP 27.3.4.15, corresponding to erts from 15.0 before 17.0.4, 16.4.0.4 and 15.2.7.11.
References
- github.com/erlang/otp/security/advisories/GHSA-54pw-5645-jh86 (opens in a new tab)
- cna.erlef.org/cves/CVE-2026-54890.html (opens in a new tab)
- osv.dev/vulnerability/EEF-CVE-2026-54890 (opens in a new tab)
- erlang.org/doc/system/versions.html (opens in a new tab)
- github.com/erlang/otp/commit/dc1bf9344c0ce62717cf60866590cea0242780fd (opens in a new tab)