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OpenAdvisories
Medium · 5.9 CVE-2026-55558 EUVD-2026-63376GHSA-vxj7-4xrp-5vr4PYSEC-2026-3805

aiosmtplib: STARTTLS response injection

Published Aug 20, 2026 · Updated Aug 20, 2026 · Assigned by GitHub_M

Description

aiosmtplib is an asynchronous SMTP client for use with asyncio. Prior to 5.1.2, SMTPProtocol.start_tls in src/aiosmtplib/protocol.py consumes the server's 220 response and starts the TLS handshake without clearing SMTPProtocol._buffer. An active network attacker can place attacker-chosen SMTP response lines after the plaintext 220 response in the same network segment. The method then calls loop.start_tls; those bytes survive the transport upgrade and are parsed as the first response from inside the TLS session, desynchronizing subsequent SMTP command and response pairs. Connections using start_tls=True or opportunistic STARTTLS are affected, while connections using use_tls=True are not. This issue is fixed in version 5.1.2.

Affected products

VendorProductAffectedFixed
cole aiosmtplib < 5.1.2 —

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 aiosmtplib 5.1.2-1 —
Debian 13 aiosmtplib No fix yet —
Debian 12 aiosmtplib No fix yet —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu 26.10 aiosmtplib No fix yet —
Ubuntu 26.04 LTS aiosmtplib No fix yet —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS aiosmtplib No fix yet —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
openSUSE Tumbleweed python-aiosmtplib 5.1.2-1.1 openSUSE-SU-2026:11569-1

Affected packages

EcosystemPackageAffectedFixedRecord
PyPI aiosmtplib < 5.1.2 5.1.2 GHSA-vxj7-4xrp-5vr4

Advisories 1

References