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CVE-2023-6129

POLY1305 MAC implementation corrupts vector registers on PowerPC

Medium6.5EPSS 2.3%
Published
Updated
Reserved
Assigned by
openssl

Description

Issue summary: The POLY1305 MAC (message authentication code) implementation contains a bug that might corrupt the internal state of applications running on PowerPC CPU based platforms if the CPU provides vector instructions. Impact summary: If an attacker can influence whether the POLY1305 MAC algorithm is used, the application state might be corrupted with various application dependent consequences. The POLY1305 MAC (message authentication code) implementation in OpenSSL for PowerPC CPUs restores the contents of vector registers in a different order than they are saved. Thus the contents of some of these vector registers are corrupted when returning to the caller. The vulnerable code is used only on newer PowerPC processors supporting the PowerISA 2.07 instructions. The consequences of this kind of internal application state corruption can be various - from no consequences, if the calling application does not depend on the contents of non-volatile XMM registers at all, to the worst consequences, where the attacker could get complete control of the application process. However unless the compiler uses the vector registers for storing pointers, the most likely consequence, if any, would be an incorrect result of some application dependent calculations or a crash leading to a denial of service. The POLY1305 MAC algorithm is most frequently used as part of the CHACHA20-POLY1305 AEAD (authenticated encryption with associated data) algorithm. The most common usage of this AEAD cipher is with TLS protocol versions 1.2 and 1.3. If this cipher is enabled on the server a malicious client can influence whether this AEAD cipher is used. This implies that TLS server applications using OpenSSL can be potentially impacted. However we are currently not aware of any concrete application that would be affected by this issue therefore we consider this a Low severity security issue.

Timeline

  1. ID reserved

    By openssl

  2. · 56 days later

    Published

  3. · 3 years later

    Record updated

Changes after publication (a new score, a public exploit, EPSS crossing 1, 10 or 50 %, leaving KEV) are kept since November 2026; earlier ones are not known.

Scores

CVSS scores of CVE-2023-6129, by who scored it
Scored byCVSSScoreVector
CISA-ADPADP (enrichment)3.1Medium6.5CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:H
NVDNVD · Modified3.1Medium6.5CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:L/A:H
EPSS (exploitation in 30 days)
2.3% · top 16% of all CVEs (7 Nov 2026)
CISA SSVC
Exploitation: none · Automatable: no · Technical impact: partial
Loading the EPSS history…

The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: Medium 6.5.

Weakness

Affected products

  • OpenSSL · OpenSSL

    • affected 3.2.0 – < 3.2.1
    • affected 3.1.0 – < 3.1.5
    • affected 3.0.0 – < 3.0.13

References (13)

Sources

The same CVE in the primary databases and aggregators, to check against.

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Record last updated .