Allocation of resources without limits vulnerability in elixir-mint mint allows a remote HTTP/2 server to exhaust memory on the client host and cause a denial of service.

The Mint.HTTP2.handle_continuation/3 function in lib/mint/http2.ex accumulates the header-block fragment carried by each HTTP/2 CONTINUATION frame into a growing conn.headers_being_processed nesting, one level deeper per frame, and only releases it when a frame with the END_HEADERS flag arrives. The only guard on this accumulator is Mint.HTTP2.assert_header_block_within_max_size/2, which sums the byte size of the fragments received so far. Because a CONTINUATION frame is permitted by the protocol to carry a zero-length payload, an unbounded chain of zero-length CONTINUATION frames adds no bytes to the running total, never trips the size cap, and never emits END_HEADERS, yet each frame still nests the accumulator one level deeper.

A malicious HTTP/2 server (reachable directly, via an attacker-controlled redirect, via SSRF, or via a man-in-the-middle) can open a stream by sending a HEADERS frame without END_HEADERS and then stream zero-length CONTINUATION frames indefinitely. Client memory grows one cons cell per frame received; sustained bandwidth from the peer drives the BEAM node running the Mint client to memory exhaustion and eventual out-of-memory termination.

This issue affects mint: from 0.1.0 before 1.9.2.

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History

Tue, 14 Jul 2026 13:30:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
Metrics ssvc

{'options': {'Automatable': 'no', 'Exploitation': 'poc', 'Technical Impact': 'partial'}, 'version': '2.0.3'}


Tue, 14 Jul 2026 09:15:00 +0000

Type Values Removed Values Added
Description Allocation of resources without limits vulnerability in elixir-mint mint allows a remote HTTP/2 server to exhaust memory on the client host and cause a denial of service. The Mint.HTTP2.handle_continuation/3 function in lib/mint/http2.ex accumulates the header-block fragment carried by each HTTP/2 CONTINUATION frame into a growing conn.headers_being_processed nesting, one level deeper per frame, and only releases it when a frame with the END_HEADERS flag arrives. The only guard on this accumulator is Mint.HTTP2.assert_header_block_within_max_size/2, which sums the byte size of the fragments received so far. Because a CONTINUATION frame is permitted by the protocol to carry a zero-length payload, an unbounded chain of zero-length CONTINUATION frames adds no bytes to the running total, never trips the size cap, and never emits END_HEADERS, yet each frame still nests the accumulator one level deeper. A malicious HTTP/2 server (reachable directly, via an attacker-controlled redirect, via SSRF, or via a man-in-the-middle) can open a stream by sending a HEADERS frame without END_HEADERS and then stream zero-length CONTINUATION frames indefinitely. Client memory grows one cons cell per frame received; sustained bandwidth from the peer drives the BEAM node running the Mint client to memory exhaustion and eventual out-of-memory termination. This issue affects mint: from 0.1.0 before 1.9.2.
Title Zero-length HTTP/2 CONTINUATION frames bypass Mint's header-block byte-size cap and exhaust client memory
First Time appeared Elixir-mint
Elixir-mint mint
Weaknesses CWE-770
CPEs cpe:2.3:a:elixir-mint:mint:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
Vendors & Products Elixir-mint
Elixir-mint mint
References
Metrics cvssV4_0

{'score': 6.3, 'vector': 'CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:L/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N'}


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cve-icon MITRE

Status: PUBLISHED

Assigner: EEF

Published:

Updated: 2026-07-14T15:08:39.463Z

Reserved: 2026-07-04T04:24:03.652Z

Link: CVE-2026-59246

cve-icon Vulnrichment

Updated: 2026-07-14T12:24:16.265Z

cve-icon NVD

No data.

cve-icon Redhat

No data.

cve-icon OpenCVE Enrichment

Updated: 2026-07-14T10:30:08Z

Weaknesses