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Reachable Assertion (CWE-617) in Elasticsearch can lead...

Moderate severity Unreviewed Published Jul 21, 2026 to the GitHub Advisory Database • Updated Jul 21, 2026

Package

No package listed— Suggest a package

Affected versions

Unknown

Patched versions

Unknown

Description

Reachable Assertion (CWE-617) in Elasticsearch can lead to denial of service via Input Data Manipulation (CAPEC-153). A specially crafted search request containing a null value in a specific query clause causes an internal assertion to be raised during query parsing. Because Elasticsearch treats assertion failures as fatal errors, this terminates the affected node process. A low-privileged authenticated user with read access to at least one index can exploit this condition with a single request to cause a node to terminate, disrupting search availability. In a single-node deployment this fully stops Elasticsearch; in a multi-node cluster it reduces cluster capacity for each affected node.

References

Published by the National Vulnerability Database Jul 21, 2026
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Jul 21, 2026
Last updated Jul 21, 2026

Severity

Moderate

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
Low
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

EPSS score

Exploit Prediction Scoring System (EPSS)

This score estimates the probability of this vulnerability being exploited within the next 30 days. Data provided by FIRST.
(15th percentile)

Weaknesses

Reachable Assertion

The product contains an assert() or similar statement that can be triggered by an attacker, which leads to an application exit or other behavior that is more severe than necessary. Learn more on MITRE.

CVE ID

CVE-2026-63140

GHSA ID

GHSA-h663-9fgh-w7xf

Source code

No known source code

Dependabot alerts are not supported on this advisory because it does not have a package from a supported ecosystem with an affected and fixed version.

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