openssl_encrypt before 1.4.9 fails to validate KDF cost parameters in encrypted file metadata and keystore headers, allowing attackers to trigger unbounded memory allocation. Attackers can craft malicious encrypted files declaring arbitrarily large Argon2, scrypt, or balloon KDF parameters to exhaust system memory and crash the process without authentication.
openssl_encrypt before 1.4.9 fails to validate the memory_cost parameter from identity file protection blocks, allowing attackers to trigger out-of-memory conditions during key derivation. Attackers with write access to local identity stores can craft malicious identity files with excessive memory_cost values that cause the host to crash when unlocking identities before authentication.
openssl_encrypt before 1.4.9 executes untrusted third-party plugins with insufficient controls: the plugin signature policy defaulted to WARN, so an unsigned/unverifiable non-built-in plugin was compiled and executed in the host process at import time, before the runtime sandbox is installed. The only default gate was an incomplete, bypassable AST denylist. If a user is induced to load an attacker's plugin, this results in arbitrary code execution with the privileges of the user running openssl_encrypt. Fixed in 1.4.9 by defaulting the signature policy to ENFORCE for non-built-in plugins.
openssl_encrypt versions before 1.4.9 use under-parameterized PBKDF2-HMAC-SHA256 with only 100,000 iterations to protect PQC keyfile private keys and 10,000 iterations for dual-encryption file-password verification. Attackers who obtain keyfiles or encrypted files can brute-force wrapping passwords offline using GPU or ASIC acceleration.
openssl_encrypt (pip package openssl-encrypt) before 1.4.9 contains two weaknesses in the portable USB drive feature, whose threat model treats the removable drive as untrusted (attacker with physical write access). USBDriveCreator._verify_integrity_file only validates files listed in the manifest, so files added to the drive — including a root-level autorun payload — are not detected and integrity verification still passes. Additionally, a globally constant, source-embedded KDF salt (_LEGACY_FIXED_SALT) is used to derive the drive encryption key for any drive lacking a per-drive salt file, defeating precomputation resistance and enabling an offline rainbow-table attack.
openssl_encrypt (pip: openssl-encrypt) versions before 1.4.9 contain a path traversal flaw in PluginSandbox._is_safe_path, which authorized file access using a bare string-prefix match. A sandboxed plugin without the READ_FILES permission could read or write another plugin's directory that merely shares a name prefix (e.g., .../plugins/foobar matching allowed .../plugins/foo), breaking per-plugin isolation within the same user. Fixed by matching each allowed directory exactly or with a trailing path separator.
openssl_encrypt (pip package openssl-encrypt) versions <= 1.4.8 do not redact the keyserver bearer token passed as the positional argument to 'keyserver set-token' in the --debug argv dump, because sanitize_argv_for_debug fails to sanitize it. As a result the token is printed in cleartext to stderr under --debug (even without --unsafe-show-secrets), persisting the credential in logs and terminal history. Fixed in 1.4.9.
openssl_encrypt (pip: openssl-encrypt) versions <= 1.4.8 use suffix-tolerant fingerprint matching in enroll_trust_key when binding a plugin-signing trust anchor. An operator who confirms a short (forgeable, ~32-bit) GPG key id could unknowingly enroll an attacker's colliding key as a trusted anchor, which then vouches for malicious plugins under the ENFORCE signature policy. Version 1.4.9 fixes this by requiring the confirmed value to exactly match the full primary-key fingerprint (case-insensitive, whitespace-stripped).
openssl_encrypt before 1.4.9 fails to sanitize the email field of imported identity documents, allowing attackers to inject ANSI escape sequences that forge the fingerprint verification line displayed to users. Attackers can deliver a crafted identity bundle through normal contact-exchange flows or keyserver responses to manipulate terminal output and display a fraudulent fingerprint, bypassing the out-of-band verification mechanism that protects against key substitution attacks.
openssl_encrypt before 1.4.9 fails to prevent namespace collisions between own identities and contacts in IdentityStore, allowing attackers to create shadowed contact entries invisible until the corresponding own identity is deleted. When the own identity is deleted, the shadowed contact becomes visible and resolves to the attacker's keys, enabling silent key substitution for encrypted files.
openssl-encrypt before 1.4.9 fails to redact the file password in its --debug argv dump when the password is supplied via bundled short-option spellings (e.g. -apHunter2) or abbreviated long-option spellings (e.g. --passw). The sanitizer only recognized exact option names, --option=value forms, and tokens starting with -p, so these spellings bypass the redaction chokepoint and the cleartext password is written to stderr. Anyone with access to that output (terminal scrollback, merged 2>&1 output, CI job logs, or the GUI's persistent debug log) can recover the password.
openssl_encrypt versions before 1.4.9 contain a weak key derivation vulnerability in the D-Bus CryptoService.EncryptFile handler that uses unstretched SHA-256 instead of Argon2id. Attackers can perform offline password guessing against encrypted files roughly six to seven orders of magnitude faster than documented protection by exploiting the missing key stretching and hash rounds.
openssl_encrypt versions before 1.4.9 fail to validate encryption status of embedded post-quantum private keys in file metadata. Attackers can craft files with unencrypted embedded PQC keys that decrypt under any password, bypassing authentication and producing attacker-chosen plaintext with false integrity verification.
openssl_encrypt before 1.4.9 fails to re-derive and validate fingerprints when loading identities from identity.json, allowing attackers to substitute public keys in identity stores. Attackers can replace legitimate public keys with their own while maintaining the claimed fingerprint, enabling silent key substitution where encryption uses attacker keys and signature verification appears valid.
openssl_encrypt versions before 1.4.9 use a denylist to identify trusted built-in plugins, allowing unsigned plugins in top-level plugins/ directories and unknown subdirectories to bypass signature verification. Attackers can place malicious unsigned plugins following documented installation paths to achieve arbitrary code execution in the CLI process with access to passwords and cryptographic keys.
openssl_encrypt versions before 1.4.9 contain a signature verification vulnerability in gpg_runner.verify_detached that accepts revoked and expired keys by only checking VALIDSIG status without inspecting REVKEYSIG, EXPKEYSIG, or gpg exit codes. Attackers holding compromised-then-revoked signing keys or expired project keys can bypass signature verification to execute malicious plugins in the host process.
openssl_encrypt versions before 1.4.9 fail to properly validate key derivation function costs in crafted files, allowing attackers to trigger unbounded memory and CPU exhaustion during pre-authentication processing. Attackers can supply malicious files with excessive KDF parameters to exhaust system resources and crash or wedge the process before password verification occurs.
openssl_encrypt versions before 1.4.9 contain a shell injection vulnerability in the info command's reconstructed CLI block that interpolates untrusted metadata fields without quoting. Attackers can craft metadata values like pepper_name containing shell commands that execute when users copy the printed CLI block into a shell.
openssl_encrypt (pip package openssl-encrypt) versions <= 1.4.8 contain a CWD-relative configuration file resolution flaw in crypt_settings.py, where CONFIG_FILE (originally the absolute per-user path ~/.crypt_settings.json) is reassigned at line 84 to the bare relative name 'crypt_settings.json'. As a result, the legacy Tk GUI's SettingsTab reads and writes KDF settings from crypt_settings.json in the process launch (current working) directory instead of the user's home directory. An attacker who plants a malicious crypt_settings.json (e.g. sha256:1 with all memory-hard KDFs disabled) can silently downgrade encryption performed in that GUI session to roughly one hash round, bypassing the weak-KDF preflight and enabling offline brute-force attacks against the resulting ciphertext. Fixed in 1.4.9.
openssl_encrypt versions before 1.4.9 fail to sanitize terminal control characters in file metadata printed by the info command. Attackers can craft malicious files containing escape sequences to repaint terminal output and forge verification information displayed to users.