AUGUST 4, 2026
Live Feed
Back to database
Case File

CVE-2021-21295

MEDIUM · CVSS 5.9 EPSS 18.89% Public Exploit

Source: NVD + CISA KEV + EPSS (historical backfill) · Published 2021-03-09 · Last synced 2026-08-04

CyberRota Analysis

This is a medium severity vulnerability with a CVSS score of 5.9. It affects GitHub. Public exploit code or proof-of-concept references have been detected in its references. Its EPSS score suggests a 18.9% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days. It may be remotely exploitable.

Public Exploit Signal

A public exploit, PoC, GitHub repository or Metasploit reference was detected for this CVE.

Note: these links are listed for security research and verification purposes only.

CVE
CVE-2021-21295
Severity
MEDIUM
CVSS
5.9
EPSS
18.89%
GitHub

Original NVD Description

Netty is an open-source, asynchronous event-driven network application framework for rapid development of maintainable high performance protocol servers & clients. In Netty (io.netty:netty-codec-http2) before version 4.1.60.Final there is a vulnerability that enables request smuggling. If a Content-Length header is present in the original HTTP/2 request, the field is not validated by `Http2MultiplexHandler` as it is propagated up. This is fine as long as the request is not proxied through as HTTP/1.1. If the request comes in as an HTTP/2 stream, gets converted into the HTTP/1.1 domain objects (`HttpRequest`, `HttpContent`, etc.) via `Http2StreamFrameToHttpObjectCodec `and then sent up to the child channel's pipeline and proxied through a remote peer as HTTP/1.1 this may result in request smuggling. In a proxy case, users may assume the content-length is validated somehow, which is not the case. If the request is forwarded to a backend channel that is a HTTP/1.1 connection, the Content-Length now has meaning and needs to be checked. An attacker can smuggle requests inside the body as it gets downgraded from HTTP/2 to HTTP/1.1. For an example attack refer to the linked GitHub Advisory. Users are only affected if all of this is true: `HTTP2MultiplexCodec` or `Http2FrameCodec` is used, `Http2StreamFrameToHttpObjectCodec` is used to convert to HTTP/1.1 objects, and these HTTP/1.1 objects are forwarded to another remote peer. This has been patched in 4.1.60.Final As a workaround, the user can do the validation by themselves by implementing a custom `ChannelInboundHandler` that is put in the `ChannelPipeline` behind `Http2StreamFrameToHttpObjectCodec`.

Related CVEs

Other vulnerabilities affecting the same vendor(s)