CVE-2025-52473

liboqs secret-dependent branching in HQC reference implementation when compiled with Clang 17-20

State
Published
Severity
5.9 Medium
Published
Jul 10, 2025
Updated
Jul 10, 2025
Reserved
Jun 17, 2025

Read the record on cve.org

Description

liboqs is a C-language cryptographic library that provides implementations of post-quantum cryptography algorithms. Multiple secret-dependent branches have been identified in the reference implementation of the HQC key encapsulation mechanism when it is compiled with Clang for optimization levels above -O0 (-O1, -O2, etc). A proof-of-concept local attack exploits this secret-dependent information to recover the entire secret key. This vulnerability is fixed in 0.14.0.

Scores

CVSSScoreVectorSource
3.15.9 MediumCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:NGitHub_M

Weaknesses

  • CWE-200 Exposure of Sensitive Information to an Unauthorized Actor

Affected Products

ProductVersions
liboqsopen-quantum-safe
  • < 0.14.0Affected

References

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