Nettle is a compact, widely embedded cryptographic library used across numerous downstream applications and systems, giving its vulnerability footprint outsized importance despite a narrow product scope. Its disclosures skew strongly toward critical-severity outcomes and center on cryptographic implementation weaknesses—including observable timing discrepancies, out-of-bounds writes, and use of broken or risky algorithms—that can compromise the security of any software that links the library. Defenders should treat Nettle updates as high-priority and inventory affected products across server, embedded, and application ecosystems, as remediation typically depends on downstream vendors rebuilding; live exploitation and exposure counts are shown alongside this summary.
The number and severity of CVEs published that impact products developed by Nettle Project over time
Signals from CVEs in this vendor scope (8 CVEs).
8 CVEs · Highest risk first
| CVE | Published | CVSS | Risk | KEV | Exploit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
CVE-2015-8805CRITICAL The ecc_256_modq function in ecc-256.c in Nettle before 3.2 does not properly handle carry propagation and produces incorrect output in its implementation of the P-256 NIST ellipti | Feb 23, 2016 | 9.8 | 30 | NO | NO |
CVE-2015-8803CRITICAL The ecc_256_modp function in ecc-256.c in Nettle before 3.2 does not properly handle carry propagation and produces incorrect output in its implementation of the P-256 NIST ellipti | Feb 23, 2016 | 9.8 | 29 | NO | NO |
CVE-2021-3580HIGH A flaw was found in the way nettle's RSA decryption functions handled specially crafted ciphertext. An attacker could use this flaw to provide a manipulated ciphertext leading to a | Aug 5, 2021 | 7.5 | 26 | NO | NO |
CVE-2021-20305HIGH A flaw was found in Nettle in versions before 3.7.2, where several Nettle signature verification functions (GOST DSA, EDDSA & ECDSA) result in the Elliptic Curve Cryptography point | Apr 5, 2021 | 8.1 | 26 | NO | NO |
CVE-2016-6489HIGH The RSA and DSA decryption code in Nettle makes it easier for attackers to discover private keys via a cache side channel attack. | Apr 14, 2017 | 7.5 | 25 | NO | NO |
CVE-2015-8804CRITICAL x86_64/ecc-384-modp.asm in Nettle before 3.2 does not properly handle carry propagation and produces incorrect output in its implementation of the P-384 NIST elliptic curve, which | Feb 23, 2016 | 9.8 | 25 | NO | NO |
CVE-2023-36660CRITICAL The OCB feature in libnettle in Nettle 3.9 before 3.9.1 allows memory corruption. | Jun 25, 2023 | 9.8 | 24 | NO | NO |
CVE-2018-16869MEDIUM A Bleichenbacher type side-channel based padding oracle attack was found in the way nettle handles endian conversion of RSA decrypted PKCS#1 v1.5 data. An attacker who is able to r | Dec 3, 2018 | 5.7 | 21 | NO | NO |
Signals from CVEs in this vendor scope (8 CVEs).
An overview of all social media posts that mention a CVE ID that affects a product developed by Nettle Project.
Media articles that mention a CVE ID that affects a product developed by Nettle Project — matched by CVE ID, not by vendor name.