CVE-2020-11077 | HTTP Smuggling via Transfer-Encoding Header in Puma

In Puma (RubyGem) before 4.3.5 and 3.12.6, a client could smuggle a request through a proxy, causing the proxy to send a response back to another unknown client. If the proxy uses persistent connections and the client adds another request in via HTTP pipelining, the proxy may mistake it as the first request's body. Puma, however, would see it as two requests, and when processing the second request, send back a response that the proxy does not expect. If the proxy has reused the persistent connection to Puma to send another request for a different client, the second response from the first client will be sent to the second client. This is a similar but different vulnerability from CVE-2020-11076. The problem has been fixed in Puma 3.12.6 and Puma 4.3.5.

Published: 2020-05-22 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]

Conclusion & alert: CVE-2020-11077 is rated Moderate Risk (53.5/100): CVSS Medium severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.82%). Mandatory action: Review affected assets and schedule remediation.

Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2020-11077

EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).

# Date Old EPSS score New EPSS score Delta (New - Old)
1 2026-03-04 0.49% 0.82% +0.33%
2 2026-03-01 0.82% 0.49% -0.33%
3 2026-02-04 0.82%

Full EPSS history (43 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2020-11077

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
6.8 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:H/A:N Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:H)
Even with access, the exploit needs extra luck, timing, or a fussy environment to actually work.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:C)
Breaking this can reach past the original component and bite other resources—bigger blast radius.
Confidentiality (C:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.
2.2 4.0 [email protected]
7.5 3.1 HIGH
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.
3.9 3.6 [email protected]
5.0 2.0 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:N Click to expand
Access vector (AV:N)
Can be exploited remotely over network reachability.
Access complexity (AC:L)
Exploitation conditions are straightforward and predictable.
Authentication (AU:N)
No authentication is required.
Confidentiality impact (C:N)
No confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:P)
Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:N)
No availability impact.
10.0 2.9 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2020-11077

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2020-11077

GHSA-w64w-qqph-5gxm · Severity: medium · Ecosystem: rubygems — HTTP Smuggling via Transfer-Encoding Header in Puma

OS Trackers for CVE-2020-11077

vendor priority summary link
debian not yet assigned CVE-2020-11077 not yet assigned priority: Debian including 1 source packages (puma), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2020-11077
redhat medium https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-11077
suse medium https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-11077/
ubuntu medium CVE-2020-11077 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (puma), 16 status rows across 16 suites (bionic, eoan, focal, groovy, hirsute, impish, jammy, kinetic, lunar, mantic, noble, oracular, plucky, trusty, upstream, xenial): not-affected 7, ignored 4, DNE 3, needs-triage 1, released 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2020-11077

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2020-11077

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
puma puma >= 3.0.0, < 3.12.6 cpe:2.3:a:puma:puma:*:*:*:*:*:ruby:*:*
puma puma >= 4.0.0, < 4.3.5 cpe:2.3:a:puma:puma:*:*:*:*:*:ruby:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 33 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:33:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
debian debian_linux 9.0 cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:9.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
opensuse leap 15.1 cpe:2.3:o:opensuse:leap:15.1:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
opensuse leap 15.2 cpe:2.3:o:opensuse:leap:15.2:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2020-11077

cvelogic Threat Intelligence