CVE-2026-55470 is a high-severity (CVSS 7.5) CWE-1333 vulnerability in ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2. O3 Security confirms whether CVE-2026-55470 is actually reachable in your code before you act, and blocks exploitation at runtime until you patch.
HAPI FHIR: DSTU2 FHIRPathEngine.matches() missing RegexTimeout protection allows ReDoS
Exploitation Status
Proof-of-concept exploit code exists
- CISA’s SSVC triage found public proof-of-concept exploit code for this CVE, though no confirmed active exploitation.
- CISA assesses this as automatable — exploitation doesn’t require manual, per-target effort, which raises the odds of mass scanning and opportunistic attacks.
Exploitation and automatability from CISA’s SSVC triage for CVE-2026-55470.
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-2026-55470 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 363,588 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
ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2☕ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.convertors☕ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.validation☕ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.validation.cliReal-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
HAPI FHIR is a complete implementation of the HL7 FHIR standard for healthcare interoperability in Java. Prior to 6.9.10, the fix for CVE-2026-45367 incompletely patched the DSTU2 module, leaving FHIRPathEngine.matches() in org.hl7.fhir.dstu2/utils/FHIRPathEngine.java to call raw String.matches(sw) without RegexTimeout protection while replaceMatches() was updated, allowing an unauthenticated attacker to trigger catastrophic regex backtracking and exhaust server CPU. This issue is fixed in version 6.9.10.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| ☕Maven | ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2 | all versions | 6.9.10 |
| ☕Maven | ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.convertors | all versions | 6.9.10 |
| ☕Maven | ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.validation | all versions | 6.9.10 |
| ☕Maven | ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.validation.cli | all versions | 6.9.10 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2. 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 ca.uhn.hapi.fhir:org.hl7.fhir.dstu2 to 6.9.10 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2026-55470 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-2026-55470 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-2026-55470. 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 flaw is rated as Important because an unauthenticated, remote attacker can exploit an incomplete patch in the HAPI FHIR DSTU2 module. By submitting a specially crafted FHIRPath expression, an attacker can trigger a Regular Expression Denial of Service (ReDoS) attack, leading to significant resource exhaustion and…
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2026-55470 in your dependencies?
O3 detects CVE-2026-55470 across Maven dependencies and uses function-level reachability to confirm whether the vulnerable code path is actually reachable — not just present. No false positives.