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OpenAdvisories
High · 7.5 CVE-2026-53994 EUVD-2026-45396GHSA-435f-wcrw-9x3x

ProFTPD mod_sftp Heap Buffer Overflow via Unsigned Integer Underflow and Size Truncation

Published Jul 18, 2026 · Updated Jul 28, 2026 · Assigned by VulnCheck

Description

ProFTPD mod_sftp contains a heap-based buffer overflow reachable by an authenticated SFTP user. The fxp_packet_read() function accepts the attacker-supplied 32-bit big-endian SFTP packet length without a minimum sanity check. A value of 0 causes an unsigned subtraction elsewhere in the read path to underflow to approximately 4 GB. That oversized request reaches the core memory allocator, where the rounded size is computed in size_t but passed to new_block() as a 32-bit int; the low 32 bits of 0x100000000 are 0, so new_block() returns a small (~512-byte) block while the caller is told it received ~4 GB. The subsequent fill loop then streams attacker-controlled bytes past the end of the 544-byte allocation, producing an attacker-controlled heap buffer overflow. An authenticated user can crash the per-connection ProFTPD session child on demand with a single malformed SFTP packet (packet_len=0 followed by a body greater than approximately 544 bytes), producing reliable authenticated remote denial of service. Depending on heap layout and adjacent allocations, heap metadata corruption and further consequences beyond denial of service may be possible, though only denial of service is demonstrated by the supplied proof of concept.

Affected products

VendorProductAffectedFixed
ProFTPD Project ProFTPD — —

Fixed in Linux distributions

Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.

ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Debian 14 proftpd-dfsg 1.3.9b~dfsg-1 —
Debian 13 proftpd-dfsg 1.3.8.c+dfsg-4+deb13u3 —
Debian 12 proftpd-dfsg No fix yet —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS proftpd-dfsg No fix yet —
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS proftpd-dfsg No fix yet —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS proftpd-dfsg No fix yet —
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS proftpd-dfsg No fix yet —
Ubuntu 18.04 LTS proftpd-dfsg No fix yet —
Show 1 more (older releases, extended support, other products)
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu 16.04 LTS proftpd-dfsg No fix yet —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
SLES 15 SP7 proftpd 1.3.8b-150600.13.18.1 SUSE-SU-2026:5181-1
SLES 15 SP6 proftpd 1.3.8b-150600.13.18.1 SUSE-SU-2026:5181-1
Show 1 more (older releases, extended support, other products)
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
SLES for SAP 15 SP6 proftpd 1.3.8b-150600.13.18.1 SUSE-SU-2026:5181-1
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
openSUSE Tumbleweed proftpd 1.3.9e-2.1 openSUSE-SU-2026:12517-1

Advisories 4

References