CVE-2026-47738

Name of the Vulnerable Software and Affected Versions liboqs versions prior to 0.16.0

Description In the C-language cryptographic library liboqs, the OQS KEM encaps derand function can dereference an uninitialized encaps derand function pointer. This occurs when the function is called on specific NTRU schemes (NTRU-HPS-2048-509, NTRU-HPS-2048-677, NTRU-HPS-4096-821, NTRU-HPS-4096-1229, NTRU-HRSS-701, or NTRU-HRSS-1373) because these schemes do not support derandomized encapsulation. The issue arises because OQS KEM objects are allocated without zero initialization, and the wrapper in src/kem/kem.c only verifies that the OQS KEM pointer is non-null before executing the residual heap value. This can lead to a calling-process crash and denial of service if an application instantiates one of the affected NTRU KEMs and invokes OQS KEM encaps derand on it.

Recommendations Update to version 0.16.0. Avoid invoking the OQS KEM encaps derand function when using NTRU-HPS-2048-509, NTRU-HPS-2048-677, NTRU-HPS-4096-821, NTRU-HPS-4096-1229, NTRU-HRSS-701, or NTRU-HRSS-1373.