CVE-2026-26365
📋 TL;DR
CVE-2026-26365 is an HTTP request smuggling vulnerability in Akamai Ghost on Akamai CDN edge servers. It allows attackers to send specially crafted HTTP requests that cause the origin server to misinterpret request boundaries, potentially leading to cache poisoning, session hijacking, or credential theft. Organizations using affected Akamai CDN configurations are impacted.
💻 Affected Systems
- Akamai Ghost on Akamai CDN edge servers
⚠️ Manual Verification Required
This CVE does not have specific version information in our database, so automatic vulnerability detection cannot determine if your system is affected.
Why? The CVE database entry doesn't specify which versions are vulnerable (no version ranges provided by the vendor/NVD).
🔒 Custom verification scripts are available for registered users. Sign up free to download automated test scripts.
- Review the CVE details at NVD
- Check vendor security advisories for your specific version
- Test if the vulnerability is exploitable in your environment
- Consider updating to the latest version as a precaution
⚠️ Risk & Real-World Impact
Worst Case
Attackers could poison CDN caches with malicious content, hijack user sessions, steal credentials, or bypass security controls by smuggling requests to backend servers.
Likely Case
Cache poisoning leading to content manipulation or credential theft through request smuggling to backend applications.
If Mitigated
Limited impact with proper request validation and monitoring, though some request smuggling attempts may still occur.
🎯 Exploit Status
Exploitation requires understanding of HTTP request smuggling techniques and Akamai's request processing paths. No public exploits available as of analysis.
🛠️ Fix & Mitigation
✅ Official Fix
Patch Version: Akamai CDN edge servers updated on or after 2026-02-06
Vendor Advisory: https://www.akamai.com/blog/security-research/cve-2026-26365-incorrect-processing-connection-transfer-encoding
Restart Required: No
Instructions:
1. Contact Akamai support to confirm your CDN configuration is updated. 2. Verify edge servers are running post-2026-02-06 updates. 3. No customer-side patching required - Akamai handles infrastructure updates.
🔧 Temporary Workarounds
Request Header Validation
allImplement origin server validation to reject requests with suspicious Connection: Transfer-Encoding headers
# Configure web server (e.g., nginx) to validate headers
# Example nginx config snippet:
# if ($http_connection ~* "transfer-encoding") { return 400; }
🧯 If You Can't Patch
- Implement strict HTTP request validation on origin servers to detect and block malformed requests
- Monitor for unusual request patterns and implement WAF rules to block requests with suspicious Connection headers
🔍 How to Verify
Check if Vulnerable:
Contact Akamai support to verify your CDN configuration version. Check if edge servers process requests before 2026-02-06.Check Version:
# Contact Akamai support for version verification
# No direct customer command availableVerify Fix Applied:
Confirm with Akamai that your CDN configuration uses edge servers updated on or after 2026-02-06. Test with controlled request smuggling attempts.📡 Detection & Monitoring
Log Indicators:
- Unusual HTTP requests with Connection: Transfer-Encoding headers
- Origin server errors related to malformed HTTP requests
- Mismatched request/response patterns in CDN logs
Network Indicators:
- HTTP requests smuggling attempts with custom hop-by-hop headers
- Abnormal request sizes or chunking patterns
SIEM Query:
http.headers: "Connection: Transfer-Encoding" OR http.status_code: 400 AND http.request_size: >threshold