CVE-2022-41859 — In freeradius, the EAP-PWD function compute_password_element() leaks information

In freeradius, the EAP-PWD function compute_password_element() leaks information about the password which allows an attacker to substantially reduce the size of an offline dictionary attack.

01What is this vulnerability?

In freeradius, the EAP-PWD function compute_password_element() leaks information about the password which allows an attacker to substantially reduce the size of an offline dictionary attack.

02Affected products

Vendor	Product	Versions
n	a / freeradius	unknown

03Active exploitation status

Not currently listed on the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog. EPSS is the best forward-looking signal — see the EPSS row above.

04Recommended remediation

• Patch to a fixed version listed in the vendor advisory (see references below).
• Mitigate with WAF rules, network egress filters, or feature flags where the patch is not yet available.
• Hunt historical logs for exploitation indicators — see Detection signatures below.

05Technical details

For the full vendor write-up, exploit chains, and reference implementations, see the references list in section 09.

06Detection signatures

Ask SARA in chat to draft a starting detection for this CVE in your stack of choice.

07Related CVEs

No directly-cited follow-up CVEs in the KB record for this advisory. The references list in section 09 carries the vendor cross-references.

08Timeline

• Published: 2023-01-17T00:00:00.000Z
• Last modified: 2025-11-03T19:27:37.502Z

09References

• freeradius.org — https://freeradius.org/security/
• github.com — https://github.com/FreeRADIUS/freeradius-server/commit/9e5e8f2f