CVE-2026-45292 is a medium-severity (CVSS 5.3) CWE-770 vulnerability in io.opentelemetry:opentelemetry-api. O3 Security confirms whether CVE-2026-45292 is actually reachable in your code before you act, and blocks exploitation at runtime until you patch.
opentelemetry-java: Unbounded Memory Allocation in W3C Baggage Propagation
Exploitation Status
No confirmed exploitation observed yet
- 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-2026-45292.
EPSS Exploitation Probability
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-2026-45292 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 0 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
io.opentelemetry:opentelemetry-api☕io.opentelemetry:opentelemetry-extension-trace-propagatorsReal-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
opentelemetry-java is the Java implementation of the OpenTelemetry API for recording telemetry, and SDK for managing telemetry recorded by the API. Prior to 1.62.0, a vulnerability affects the baggage propagation implementation in opentelemetry-api and opentelemetry-extension-trace-propagators. Parsing oversized baggage causes unbounded memory allocation and CPU consumption. Because baggage is automatically re-injected into every outgoing request, the effect can fan out to downstream services that never received the original malicious request. This vulnerability is fixed in 1.62.0.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☕Maven | io.opentelemetry:opentelemetry-api | all versions | 1.62.0 |
| ☕Maven | io.opentelemetry:opentelemetry-extension-trace-propagators | all versions | 1.62.0 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for io.opentelemetry:opentelemetry-api. O3's reachability analysis confirms whether the vulnerable code path is actually invoked in your application, so you act on real exposure instead of every transitive match.
Fix
Update io.opentelemetry:opentelemetry-api to 1.62.0 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2026-45292 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 pinpoints whether CVE-2026-45292 is reachable in your code and exactly where to fix it, then blocks exploitation in production at runtime until the patched version is deployed.
Tailored to CVE-2026-45292. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Fixing This On Your OS
If you run this on a Linux distribution, patch through your package manager against the distro's own security advisory below — it tracks the exact backported fix for your release, which can ship on a different timeline (and sometimes a different severity) than the upstream project.
This is an Important denial of service vulnerability in OpenTelemetry Java's baggage propagation, affecting Red Hat products that use OpenTelemetry for telemetry. A remote attacker can exploit this by sending excessively large baggage, leading to uncontrolled memory and CPU usage. The vulnerability's impact can extend…
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2026-45292 in your dependencies?
O3 detects CVE-2026-45292 across Maven dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.