CVE-2026-24738: gmrtd ReadFile Vulnerable to Denial of Service via Excessive TLV Length Values

Vulnerability summary

CVE-2026-24738 is a medium (CVSS 6.5) Uncontrolled Resource Consumption vulnerability in gmrtd. EPSS estimates a 0.28% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 20.6% of scored vulnerabilities.

Timeline

1. 27-01-2026
   PublishedVulnerability first disclosed.
2. 28-01-2026
   Last modifiedVulnerability information updated.

Description

gmrtd is a Go library for reading Machine Readable Travel Documents (MRTDs). Prior to version 0.17.2, ReadFile accepts TLVs with lengths that can range up to 4GB, which can cause unconstrained resource consumption in both memory and cpu cycles. ReadFile can consume an extended TLV with lengths well outside what would be available in ICs. It can accept something all the way up to 4GB which would take too many iterations in 256 byte chunks, and would also try to allocate memory that might not be available in constrained environments like phones. Or if an API sends data to ReadFile, the same problem applies. The very small chunked read also locks the goroutine in accepting data for a very large number of iterations. projects using the gmrtd library to read files from NFCs can experience extreme slowdowns or memory consumption. A malicious NFC can just behave like the mock transceiver described above and by just sending dummy bytes as each chunk to be read, can make the receiving thread unresponsive and fill up memory on the host system. Version 0.17.2 patches the issue.

• CWE-400Uncontrolled Resource ConsumptionThe product does not properly control the allocation and maintenance of a limited resource.
• CWE-770Allocation of Resources Without Limits or ThrottlingThe product allocates a reusable resource or group of resources on behalf of an actor without imposing any intended restrictions on the size or number of resources that can be allocated.