# CVE-2026-73196: Ipa: freeipa: authenticated dos in `otptoken-add` via unbounded otp key decoding/re-encoding

Status: published. Published: 2026-08-20. Updated: 2026-11-05.

A flaw was found in FreeIPA. A low-privilege authenticated user can exploit this vulnerability by submitting an oversized One-Time Password (OTP) key value. This oversized key is then decoded and re-encoded without proper size limits, consuming excessive CPU and memory resources. This can lead to a denial of service, degrading the availability of the IPA service.

## Remediation

- workaround: To mitigate this issue, enforce conservative HTTP request-body limits on the `/ipa/session/json` endpoint to reject oversized payloads before they reach the vulnerable IPA parameter conversion. Additionally, if operationally feasible, restrict self-managed token creation to trusted users and implement monitoring or rate-limiting for repeated large authenticated requests. Changes to HTTP server configurations or FreeIPA permissions may require service restarts or reloads to take effect. (source: CNA: redhat)

## Affected products and versions

- Red Hat / Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 (ipa): Version range not reported. Source: CNA: redhat
- Red Hat / Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 (ipa): Version range not reported. Source: CNA: redhat
- Red Hat / Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 (ipa): Version range not reported. Source: CNA: redhat
- Red Hat / Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 (ipa): Version range not reported. Source: CNA: redhat
- Red Hat / Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 (ipa): Version range not reported. Source: CNA: redhat

## Severity and prioritization

- CVSS 3.1: 4.3 (medium); CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L; source: CNA: redhat

- CISA KEV: No listing in collected sources

- EPSS: 0.43% as of 2026-11-05; percentile 37.06%

- SSVC: exploitation none; automatable no; technical impact partial; source ADP: CISA-ADP

- Weaknesses: CWE-770

## Exploit evidence

No exploit evidence in collected sources. This is not proof of no exploitation.

## References

- https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-73196 (CNA: redhat; vdb-entry, x_refsource_REDHAT)

- https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2474712 (CNA: redhat; issue-tracking, x_refsource_REDHAT)

## Provenance

- CNA: redhat: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-73196; retrieved 2026-11-05; source updated 2026-11-05

- FIRST EPSS: https://api.first.org/data/v1/epss?cve=CVE-2026-73196; retrieved 2026-11-05; source updated Not reported

Revision: 8bf4e1e9877c78996d5b32b3021eceb75835cf59751028648de1b9b095f4daef

Canonical: https://y2.dev/cve/CVE-2026-73196

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