Public vulnerability disclosure

CVE-2026-104041

Sssd: sssd: denial of service via unbounded negative cache growth

publishedCWE-770

A flaw was found in SSSD. An unprivileged local user can repeatedly request lookups for nonexistent entries through the Name Service Switch (NSS) responder. Because the negative cache does not limit the total number of stored entries and only removes expired records when an existing key is rechecked, the cache can grow without bound. This behavior can lead to memory exhaustion, resulting in a Denial of Service (DoS) as the responder becomes unresponsive or terminates.

Technical severity5.5 mediumCVSS 3.1 · CNA: redhat
Published2026-10-06Source updated 2026-11-05
Collected2026-11-052 attributed sources

Fixes and workarounds

Workaround

Set `entry_negative_timeout = 0` in the `[nss]` section of `/etc/sssd/sssd.conf` to disable non-permanent negative-cache insertions, then restart the SSSD service (for example, `systemctl restart sssd`) to apply the change. Note that restarting sssd briefly interrupts active authentication and identity lookups, and disabling the negative cache increases lookup traffic to identity backends for nonexistent entries. If responder memory growth is observed, the accumulated negative-cache state can be cleared through the existing operational clear path or by restarting the responder. Restricting untrusted local users also limits exposure on systems where the NSS responder socket is reachable by local users.

Source: CNA: redhat

Affected products and versions

Affected products, source version ranges and reporting authorities
ProductVersionsAuthority
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10
Red Hat
sssd
https://access.redhat.com/downloads/content/package-browser/
Range not reported
Other versions: affected
CNA: redhat
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6
Red Hat
sssd
https://access.redhat.com/downloads/content/package-browser/
Range not reported
Other versions: unknown
CNA: redhat
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7
Red Hat
sssd
https://access.redhat.com/downloads/content/package-browser/
Range not reported
Other versions: affected
CNA: redhat
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8
Red Hat
sssd
https://access.redhat.com/downloads/content/package-browser/
Range not reported
Other versions: affected
CNA: redhat
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9
Red Hat
sssd
https://access.redhat.com/downloads/content/package-browser/
Range not reported
Other versions: affected
CNA: redhat
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4
Red Hat
openshift/ose-rhel-coreos-8
https://access.redhat.com/downloads/content/package-browser/
Range not reported
Other versions: affected
CNA: redhat
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 4
Red Hat
openshift/ose-rhel-coreos-9
https://access.redhat.com/downloads/content/package-browser/
Range not reported
Other versions: affected
CNA: redhat
Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform 5
Red Hat
openshift/ose-rhel-coreos-9
https://access.redhat.com/downloads/content/package-browser/
Range not reported
Other versions: affected
CNA: redhat

Version ranges are source assertions. Check the vendor advisory and your installed configuration before determining exposure.

CVSS assessments

CVSS scores, vectors and reporting authorities
Version / scoreVectorAuthority
3.1 / 5.5
medium
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:HCNA: redhat

Exploit evidence

References

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