In Bouncy Castle JCE Provider the DSA key pair generator generates a weak private key if used with default values

CVE-2016-1000343 → View on GitHub ↗ View on CVE.org ↗ View on NVD ↗

Description

In the Bouncy Castle JCE Provider version 1.55 and earlier the DSA key pair generator generates a weak private key if used with default values. If the JCA key pair generator is not explicitly initialised with DSA parameters, 1.55 and earlier generates a private value assuming a 1024 bit key size. In earlier releases this can be dealt with by explicitly passing parameters to the key pair generator.

Basic information

Type
reviewed
Severity
high
Advisory on GitHub
Open advisory ↗
Repository advisory
—
Source code
Browse source ↗
Published (advisory)
2018-10-17 16:24:22 UTC
Updated
2025-09-12 19:14:25 UTC
GitHub reviewed
2020-06-16 21:55:50 UTC
NVD published
2018-06-04

EPSS Score

Score Percentile
1.07% 77.55%

CVSS Scores

Base score Version Severity Vector
7.5 3.0 —
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/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:N)
Data isn’t meaningfully altered or forged.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.

Identifiers

Type Value
GHSA GHSA-rrvx-pwf8-p59p ↗
CVE CVE-2016-1000343 ↗

Credits

  • AndrzejBiernacki2010 (analyst)

Affected packages (3)

Vulnerable version ranges and first patched releases as published by GitHub.

Ecosystem Package Vulnerable range First patched Vulnerable functions
maven org.bouncycastle:bcprov-jdk14 < 1.56 1.56 —
maven org.bouncycastle:bcprov-jdk15 < 1.56 1.56 —
maven org.bouncycastle:bcprov-jdk15on < 1.56 1.56 —

References

cvelogic Threat Intelligence