CVE-2025-12642 | HTTP Header Smuggling via Trailer Merge

lighttpd1.4.80 incorrectly merged trailer fields into headers after http request parsing. This behavior can be exploited to conduct HTTP Header Smuggling attacks. Successful exploitation may allow an attacker to: * Bypass access control rules * Inject unsafe input into backend logic that trusts request headers * Execute HTTP Request Smuggling attacks under some conditions This issue affects lighttpd1.4.80

Published: 2025-11-03 Last update: 2025-11-12 Assigner: 1c6b5737-9389-4011-8117-89fa251edfb2 Source: 1c6b5737-9389-4011-8117-89fa251edfb2

Conclusion & alert: CVE-2025-12642 is rated Low Risk (33.6/100): CVSS Medium severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.05%). Mandatory action: Monitor for updates and reassess as exploit intelligence or EPSS changes.

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-2025-12642

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 2026-04-03 0.05% 0.05% +0.01%
2 2026-04-01 0.06% 0.05% -0.01%
3 2025-12-28 0.06%

Full EPSS history (8 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2025-12642

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
6.9 4.0 MEDIUM
CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:N/SC:N/SI:L/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Exploitation conditions are straightforward and stable.
Attack requirements (AT:N)
No additional preconditions are required beyond normal reachability.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No privileges are required.
User interaction (UI:N)
No user interaction is required.
Vulnerable system confidentiality impact (VC:N)
No confidentiality impact on the vulnerable system.
Vulnerable system integrity impact (VI:N)
No integrity impact on the vulnerable system.
Vulnerable system availability impact (VA:N)
No availability impact on the vulnerable system.
Subsequent system confidentiality impact (SC:N)
No confidentiality impact on subsequent systems.
Subsequent system integrity impact (SI:L)
Limited integrity impact on subsequent systems.
Subsequent system availability impact (SA:N)
No availability impact on subsequent systems.
Exploit maturity (threat) (E:X)
Not defined: no reliable threat intelligence; scoring assumes the worst case (equivalent to Attacked).
Confidentiality requirement (CR:X)
Not defined: insufficient information; scoring treats this like High (worst case).
Integrity requirement (IR:X)
Not defined: insufficient information; scoring treats this like High (worst case).
Availability requirement (AR:X)
Not defined: insufficient information; scoring treats this like High (worst case).
Modified attack vector (MAV:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base Attack Vector (AV).
Modified attack complexity (MAC:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base Attack Complexity (AC).
Modified attack requirements (MAT:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base Attack Requirements (AT).
Modified privileges required (MPR:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base Privileges Required (PR).
Modified user interaction (MUI:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base User Interaction (UI).
Modified vulnerable system confidentiality impact (MVC:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base VC metric.
Modified vulnerable system integrity impact (MVI:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base VI metric.
Modified vulnerable system availability impact (MVA:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base VA metric.
Modified subsequent system confidentiality impact (MSC:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base SC metric.
Modified subsequent system integrity impact (MSI:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base SI metric.
Modified subsequent system availability impact (MSA:X)
Not defined: scoring uses the Base SA metric.
Safety (supplemental) (S:X)
Not evaluated.
Automatable (supplemental) (AU:X)
Not evaluated.
Recovery (supplemental) (R:X)
Not evaluated.
Value density (supplemental) (V:X)
Not evaluated.
Vulnerability response effort (supplemental) (RE:X)
Not evaluated.
Provider urgency (supplemental) (U:X)
Not evaluated.
1c6b5737-9389-4011-8117-89fa251edfb2
9.1 3.1 CRITICAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/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:H)
Serious risk that confidential data gets exposed in a big 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 5.2 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2025-12642

OS Trackers for CVE-2025-12642

vendor priority summary link
debian unimportant CVE-2025-12642 unimportant priority: Debian including 1 source packages (lighttpd), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2025-12642
ubuntu medium CVE-2025-12642 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (lighttpd), 9 status rows across 9 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, noble, plucky, questing, trusty, upstream, xenial): needs-triage 7, ignored 1, not-affected 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2025-12642

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2025-12642

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
lighttpd lighttpd 1.4.80 cpe:2.3:a:lighttpd:lighttpd:1.4.80:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2025-12642

cvelogic Threat Intelligence