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Double-Free RCE in strongSwan libstrongswan Identity Cloning

IdentifiersCVE-2026-47895CWE-415

CVE-2026-47895 is a critical memory-corruption vulnerability in the libstrongswan component of strongSwan, affecting versions since 4.3.3. The flaw is in the identification_t class clone() handling of certain identities with an empty but non-NULL encoding. The cloning logic copies the full object before updating the encoded chunk, and it checks the chunk length instead of the pointer when deciding whether to duplicate the encoding. As a result, an empty but non-NULL chunk may remain shared between the original and cloned identity objects, causing both objects to reference the same memory. When the objects are later destroyed, this can trigger a double-free. The issue is reachable during authentication flows that use the vulnerable identity constructors, particularly EAP and EAP-Identity exchanges, and can be triggered by processing an empty identity string with specific hex-encoded prefixes. The resulting condition can crash the daemon and may be exploitable for unauthenticated remote code execution on exposed VPN servers.

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ANALYST BRIEF

Impact, mitigation & remediation

What it means. What to do now. Patch path, mitigations, and the assume-compromise checklist.

Impact

What an attacker gets, and what they’ve been doing with it.

Successful exploitation can cause a double-free in the strongSwan daemon, leading to process crash and denial of service through destruction of the IKE Security Association during failed authentication handling. Because this is a heap memory-corruption condition in a network-facing VPN service, the vulnerability may also permit unauthenticated remote code execution against vulnerable endpoints under suitable heap conditions.

Mitigation

If you can’t patch tonight, do this now.

If immediate patching is not possible, reduce exposure by disabling or avoiding authentication paths that use the vulnerable identity parsing/cloning behavior. According to the available advisories, servers that do not use EAP or XAuth authentication are not vulnerable to the described remote attack path. Servers using EAP but delegating it to a RADIUS server and not requesting EAP-Identity themselves are generally not directly exposed, except where the eap-radius plugin parses Class or Filter-Id attributes as group identities if enabled; in that case, a rogue RADIUS server could still trigger the issue. IKEv1 with XAuth is not vulnerable unless the xauth-eap plugin is used. Limiting unauthenticated exposure of affected VPN endpoints and disabling unnecessary EAP/XAuth-related plugins can further reduce risk until patches are deployed.

Remediation

Patch, then assume compromise.

Upgrade to a fixed strongSwan release. Upstream released strongSwan 6.0.7 and also provided patches for older supported releases. On Debian, fixed package versions include 5.9.8-5+deb12u5 for oldstable (bookworm) and 6.0.1-6+deb13u6 for stable (trixie). Apply vendor patches or distribution updates immediately across exposed VPN servers.

PUBLIC EXPLOITS

Exploits

No public exploits tracked yet. Mallory keeps watching.

VALID 0 / 0 TOTALView more in app

No public exploit code observed for this vulnerability.

EXPOSURE SURFACE

Affected products & vendors

Products and vendors Mallory has correlated with this vulnerability. Open in Mallory to drill down to specific CPE configurations and version ranges.

VendorProductType

StrongswanStrongswanapplication

Vendor-confirmed product mapping. Mallory continuously reconciles this list against your asset inventory.

ACTIVITY FEED

Recent activity

6 sources tracked across advisories, community write-ups, and news. New activity surfaces here as Mallory finds it.

6 SOURCESView more in app

security online infoNews

Jun 11, 2026

strongSwan CVE-2026-47895: Critical Double-Free Exploit

A critical double-free memory management vulnerability in the libstrongswan component of strongSwan that could potentially allow unauthenticated remote code execution.

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Exposure mapping

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Threat actor evidence

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Associated malware

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Detection signatures

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Vendor-by-vendor mapping

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Social activity4