How severe is CVE-2026-41081?

CVE-2026-41081 has a CVSS score of 6.5/10, rated MEDIUM. Review your exposure and patch according to your risk tolerance.

Which packages are affected by CVE-2026-41081?

CVE-2026-41081 affects the following packages: org.apache.storm:storm-client (Maven). Ecosystems affected: Maven.

How do I fix CVE-2026-41081?

Update org.apache.storm:storm-client to 2.8.7 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2026-41081 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.

How do I detect CVE-2026-41081 in my Maven dependencies?

Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for org.apache.storm:storm-client, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.

How do I mitigate CVE-2026-41081 if there is no patch (or I can't update yet)?

If you can't upgrade right away: gate or disable the affected feature, validate untrusted input at the boundary, and avoid passing attacker-controlled data into the vulnerable path. O3's runtime protection blocks exploitation in production as an interim safeguard until the upgrade lands.

How does O3 Security protect against CVE-2026-41081?

O3 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like CVE-2026-41081 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.

Is CVE-2026-41081 actively exploited in the wild?

No public exploit code has been indexed for CVE-2026-41081 yet. This does not mean the vulnerability cannot be exploited — absence of public exploits does not imply safety. Apply the recommended fix and use O3 Security to monitor your exposure.

What is the EPSS score for CVE-2026-41081?

CVE-2026-41081 has an EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) score of 0.4%, placing it in the 36th percentile of all CVEs. EPSS is maintained by FIRST.org and estimates the probability that a vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days. This score indicates relatively lower exploitation probability, though the CVSS severity should still guide your patching priority.

When was CVE-2026-41081 published, and has it been updated?

CVE-2026-41081 was published on April 27, 2026 and was last updated on August 12, 2026. Advisory data evolves as severity scores, affected ranges, and exploit intelligence are revised — always check the latest version of the advisory before acting.

☕

☕ Maven

Not in CISA KEV

MEDIUM severity

CVE-2026-41081 — storm-client

MEDIUM

CVE-2026-41081 is a medium-severity (CVSS 6.5) vulnerability in org.apache.storm:storm-client. A fix is available for org.apache.storm:storm-client — see the affected versions and patch details below.

Apache Storm Client: Anonymous principal assigned on TLS client certificate verification failure

Also known asGHSA-j2q8-xx3q-8fqh

Published

Apr 27, 2026

Updated

Aug 12, 2026

Affected

1 pkg

Patched

1 / 1

Exploits

None indexed

Exploitation data as of Sep 24, 2026 · OSV.dev, FIRST.org (EPSS)

Exploitation Status

No confirmed exploitation observed yet

CISA assesses this as automatable — exploitation doesn’t require manual, per-target effort, which raises the odds of mass scanning and opportunistic attacks.
CISA’s own triage has not observed active exploitation or public proof-of-concept code for this CVE as of its last assessment.

Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2026-41081.

EPSS Exploitation Probability

via FIRST.org ↗

0.4%probability of exploitation in next 30 days

Lower Risk0.00%

Lower risk than most CVEs36th percentile — riskier than 36% of all scored CVEsHighest risk

EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) is a daily probability model maintained by FIRST.org. It estimates the likelihood a CVE will be exploited in production environments within the next 30 days, derived from real-world threat intelligence signals.

How urgent is this, really

CVE-2026-41081 plotted by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). The shaded corner — EPSS 50%+ and CVSS 7.0+ — is where this CVE doesn't sit, though severity or exploitability alone can still warrant action.

Where this sits among everything scored

Of 378,567 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the < 10% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.

Real-World Exposure

1 pkg affected

☕org.apache.storm:storm-client

Real-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Maven packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.

Description

Improper Handling of TLS Client Authentication Failure Leading to Anonymous Principal Assignment in Apache Storm

Versions Affected: up to 2.8.7

Description: When TLS transport is enabled in Apache Storm without requiring client certificate authentication (the default configuration), the TlsTransportPlugin assigns a fallback principal (CN=ANONYMOUS) if no client certificate is presented or if certificate verification fails. The underlying SSLPeerUnverifiedException is caught and suppressed rather than rejecting the connection.

This fail-open behavior means an unauthenticated client can establish a TLS connection and receive a valid principal identity. If the configured authorizer (e.g., SimpleACLAuthorizer) does not explicitly deny access to CN=ANONYMOUS, this may result in unauthorized access to Storm services. The condition is logged at debug level only, reducing visibility in production.

Impact: Unauthenticated clients may be assigned a principal identity, potentially bypassing authorization in permissive or misconfigured environments.

Mitigation: Users should upgrade to 2.8.7 in which TLS authentication failures are handled in a fail-closed manner.

Users who cannot upgrade immediately should:

Enable mandatory client certificate authentication (nimbus.thrift.tls.client.auth.required: true)
Ensure authorization rules explicitly deny access to CN=ANONYMOUS
Review all ACL configurations for implicit default-allow behavior

Affected Packages

1 total 1 fixed

Ecosystem	Package	Vulnerable range	Fix
☕Maven	`org.apache.storm:storm-client`	all versions	2.8.7`org.apache.storm:storm-client:2.8.7`

Detection & mitigation playbook

Open-source dependency

Detect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for org.apache.storm:storm-client, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update org.apache.storm:storm-client to 2.8.7 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2026-41081 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
If you can't upgrade right away: gate or disable the affected feature, validate untrusted input at the boundary, and avoid passing attacker-controlled data into the vulnerable path. O3's runtime protection blocks exploitation in production as an interim safeguard until the upgrade lands.
How O3 protects you
O3 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like CVE-2026-41081 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.

Tailored to CVE-2026-41081. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Improper Handling of TLS Client Authentication Failure Leading to Anonymous Principal Assignment in Apache Storm Versions Affected: up to 2.8.7 Description: When TLS transport is enabled in Apache Storm without requiring client certificate authentication (the default configuration), the TlsTransportPlugin assigns a fallback principal (CN=ANONYMOUS) if no client certificate is presented or if certificate verification fails. The underlying SSLPeerUnverifiedException is caught and suppressed rather than rejecting the connection. This fail-open behavior means an unauthenticated client can estab

O3 Security · Impact-Aware SCA

Is CVE-2026-41081 in your dependencies?

O3 Security finds CVE-2026-41081 across Maven dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.

Scan my dependencies How O3 SCA works