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SwiftNIO HTTP/2: HTTP/2-to-HTTP/1 Request Smuggling via unvalidated :path pseudo-header in HTTP2ToHTTP1Codec

Low severity GitHub Reviewed Published May 21, 2026 in apple/swift-nio-http2 • Updated Jun 12, 2026

Package

swift github.com/apple/swift-nio-http2 (Swift)

Affected versions

< 1.44.1

Patched versions

1.44.1

Description

swift-nio-http2's HTTP/2-to-HTTP/1.1 codec (HTTP2FramePayloadToHTTP1ServerCodec / HTTP2ToHTTP1ServerCodec) did not validate pseudo-header values for control characters before placing them into the translated HTTP/1.1 message. A remote attacker could send an HTTP/2 request containing CR (\r), LF (\n), or NUL (\0) bytes in pseudo-header values such as :path, and when the server translated this to HTTP/1.1 — for example in a reverse-proxy configuration — the resulting output could contain injected headers or entirely smuggled requests.

This is an HTTP/2-to-HTTP/1.1 request smuggling vulnerability. HTTP/2's binary framing means that CRLF bytes are never parsed as line terminators at the HTTP/2 layer, so they pass through transparently to the HTTP/1.1 output. Any swift-nio-http2 server that translates HTTP/2 requests to HTTP/1.1 and forwards them to a backend is affected. Server-side Swift frameworks such as Vapor that use this codec in a reverse-proxy pattern are directly affected.

This vulnerability is related to GHSA-7fj7-39wj-c64f in swift-nio, which addressed CRLF injection in HTTP/1.1 header values but did not cover pseudo-header values in the HTTP/2 layer.

This vulnerability is also related to GHSA-cq87-8r7h-962v in swift-nio, which addressed CRLF injection in HTTP/1.1 version, method and path.

swift-nio-http2 1.44.0 adds validation of all pseudo-header values (:path, :authority, :scheme, :method, and :status) at both the HPACK header validation layer and the HTTP/2-to-HTTP/1.1 translation layer. Requests or responses containing CR, LF, or NUL bytes in any pseudo-header value are now rejected with a connection error.

SwiftNIO recommends all adopters upgrade to 1.44.0 as soon as possible.

SwiftNIO thanks @kuranikaran for filing this issue and the support in fixing it.

References

@Lukasa Lukasa published to apple/swift-nio-http2 May 21, 2026
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Jun 12, 2026
Reviewed Jun 12, 2026
Last updated Jun 12, 2026

Severity

Low

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
None

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:N

EPSS score

Weaknesses

Inconsistent Interpretation of HTTP Requests ('HTTP Request/Response Smuggling')

The product acts as an intermediary HTTP agent (such as a proxy or firewall) in the data flow between two entities such as a client and server, but it does not interpret malformed HTTP requests or responses in ways that are consistent with how the messages will be processed by those entities that are at the ultimate destination. Learn more on MITRE.

CVE ID

CVE-2026-28898

GHSA ID

GHSA-4px2-pw77-vc85

Source code

Credits

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