CVE-2020-5303
LOWDescription
Tendermint before versions 0.33.3, 0.32.10, and 0.31.12 has a denial-of-service vulnerability. Tendermint does not limit the number of P2P connection requests. For each p2p connection, it allocates XXX bytes. Even though this memory is garbage collected once the connection is terminated (due to duplicate IP or reaching a maximum number of inbound peers), temporary memory spikes can lead to OOM (Out-Of-Memory) exceptions. Additionally, Tendermint does not reclaim activeID of a peer after it's removed in Mempool reactor. This does not happen all the time. It only happens when a connection fails (for any reason) before the Peer is created and added to all reactors. RemovePeer is therefore called before AddPeer, which leads to always growing memory (activeIDs map). The activeIDs map has a maximum size of 65535 and the node will panic if this map reaches the maximum. An attacker can create a lot of connection attempts (exploiting above denial of service), which ultimately will lead to the node panicking. These issues are patched in Tendermint 0.33.3 and 0.32.10.
How to fix
TridentStack Control can deploy fixes like this automatically across your Windows, macOS, and Linux fleet. See how it works
Remediation is compiled from vendor and distribution security advisories. Always confirm against the linked source for your exact version and platform.
CVSS v3 Vector
Exploitability
Impact
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L
Exploit Intelligence
Moderate risk: more likely to be exploited than 69% of all known CVEs.
References
Related Vulnerabilities
Other CWE-789 vulnerabilities, ordered by exploit likelihood. View all
| CVE | Severity | CVSS | EPSS | Exploited | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CVE-2022-30522 | High | 7.5 | 90% | - | Fix |
| CVE-2026-49975 | High | 7.5 | 28% | - | Fix |
| CVE-2025-27533 | High | 7.5 | 8.6% | - | Fix |
| CVE-2017-7651 | High | 7.5 | 5.3% | - | Fix |
| CVE-2021-31811 | Medium | 5.5 | 3.4% | - | - |
| CVE-2021-27906 | Medium | 5.5 | 3.3% | - | Fix |
Common questions
How do I fix CVE-2020-5303?
Upgrade tendermint to 0.33.3 or later.
Is CVE-2020-5303 being actively exploited?
Not that we know of. CVE-2020-5303 is not in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. Its EPSS score of 1.3% is the estimated probability that it will be exploited in the next 30 days. That is higher than 69% of all scored CVEs.
How severe is CVE-2020-5303?
CVE-2020-5303 has a CVSS v3 base score of 3.1, rated low. CVSS rates the technical impact if the vulnerability is exploited, not how likely that is, so weigh it alongside the exploit-prediction score when you decide what to patch first.
What does CVE-2020-5303 affect?
Published advisories record a fix for tendermint (NVD). Only products with a sourced advisory are listed, so treat this as what we can cite rather than a complete inventory.
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This product uses NVD data but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD. EPSS scores courtesy of FIRST.org (https://www.first.org/epss). Source: CISA KEV Catalog. Data as of 2024-11-21.