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The Eclipse Jetty Server Artifact has a Gzip request memory leak

High severity GitHub Reviewed Published Mar 5, 2026 in jetty/jetty.project • Updated Mar 5, 2026

Package

maven org.eclipse.jetty:jetty-server (Maven)

Affected versions

>= 12.1.0, <= 12.1.5
>= 12.0.0, <= 12.0.31

Patched versions

12.1.6
12.0.32

Description

Description (as reported)

There is a memory leak when using GzipHandler in jetty-12.0.30 that can cause off-heap OOMs. This can be used for DoS attacks so I'm reporting this as a vulnerability.

The leak is created by requests where the request is inflated (Content-Encoding: gzip) and the response is not deflated (no Accept-Encoding: gzip). In these conditions, a new inflator will be created by GzipRequest and never released back into GzipRequest.__inflaterPool because gzipRequest.destory() is not called.

In heap dumps one can see thousands of java.util.zip.Inflator objects, which use both Java heaps and native memory. Leaking native memory causes of off-heap OOMs.

Code path in GzipHandler.handle():

  1. Line 601: GzipRequest is created when request inflation is needed.
  2. Lines 611-616: The callback is only wrapped in GzipResponseAndCallback when both inflation and deflation are needed.
  3. Lines 619-625: If the handler accepts the request (returns true), gzipRequest.destroy() is only called in the "request not accepted" path (returns false)

When deflation is needed, GzipResponseAndCallback (lines 102 and 116) properly calls gzipRequest.destroy() in its succeeded() and failed() methods. But this wrapper is only created when deflation is needed.

Possible fix:
The callback should be wrapped whenever a GzipRequest is created, not just when deflation is needed. This ensures gzipRequest.destroy() is always called when the request completes.

Impact

The leak causes the JVM to crash with OOME.

Patches

No patches yet.

Workarounds

Disable GzipHandler.

References

jetty/jetty.project#14260

https://gitlab.eclipse.org/security/cve-assignment/-/issues/79

References

@lukpueh lukpueh published to jetty/jetty.project Mar 5, 2026
Published by the National Vulnerability Database Mar 5, 2026
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Mar 5, 2026
Reviewed Mar 5, 2026
Last updated Mar 5, 2026

Severity

High

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
None
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:N/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.
(12th percentile)

Weaknesses

Uncontrolled Resource Consumption

The product does not properly control the allocation and maintenance of a limited resource. Learn more on MITRE.

CVE ID

CVE-2026-1605

GHSA ID

GHSA-xxh7-fcf3-rj7f

Source code

Credits

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