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CRITICAL

GHSA-c4c3-7fpv-j4q5

Netty: SNI Routing Bypass via Fragmented TLS ClientHello Causing Fallback to Default SslContext

Quick fix

GHSA-c4c3-7fpv-j4q5 — io.netty:netty-handler: upgrade to the fixed version with the command below.

# pom.xml: bump <version>4.2.17.Final</version> for io.netty:netty-handler

Details

### Summary A fragmented TLS ClientHello whose handshake header spans multiple records makes Netty silently fall back to the default SslContext; where per-SNI selection is the sole mTLS gate, an unauthenticated attacker can bypass the route's mTLS requirement.

### Details In `io.netty.handler.ssl.SslClientHelloHandler#decode` the guard that should wait for the 4-byte handshake header checks the wrong offset - it ignores the 5-byte record header that precedes it - and therefore never fires:

```java if (handshakeLength == -1) { if (readerIndex + 4 > endOffset) { // Need more data to read HandshakeType and handshakeLength (4 bytes) return; } ```

When the first record's payload is < 4 bytes, `handshakeLength = in.getUnsignedMedium(readerIndex + SslUtils.SSL_RECORD_HEADER_LENGTH + 1);` leads to `IndexOutOfBoundsException `. That is caught by the generic `catch (Exception)` block, which calls `select(ctx, null)` - this is the default `SslContext`. Fallback to default on parse failure is a problem when per-SNI selection is the sole mTLS gate.

### Impact SNI routing bypass. Escalates to an unauthenticated mTLS bypass only when: - mTLS is enforced solely via per-SNI SslContext (clientAuth=REQUIRE) - the default/fallback SslContext is permissive (clientAuth=NONE/OPTIONAL) - no secondary peer-certificate verification exists at the application layer.

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Affected packages

Maven/io.netty:netty-handler
Introduced in: 4.2.0.FinalFixed in: 4.2.17.Final
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>4.2.17.Final</version> for io.netty:netty-handler
Maven/io.netty:netty-handler
Introduced in: 0Fixed in: 4.1.137.Final
Fix# pom.xml: bump <version>4.1.137.Final</version> for io.netty:netty-handler

References