CVE-2026-76169: fastify vulnerable to authentication bypass via malformed URLs reaching encapsulated not-found handlers
### Impact Fastify routes a malformed URL under one plugin prefix to the custom not-found handler of a different sibling plugin, invoking the handler registered last and skipping the `preHandler` declared in its `setNotFoundHandler()`. When the request method has no route in the main router, a malformed request target reaches Fastify's internal not-found router before URL decoding and is dispatched through a single shared handler pointer, regardless of prefix and without the normal request lifecycle. An unauthenticated request to a public prefix can therefore reach an authentication-protected not-found handler registered under a different prefix and receive its full response, breaking prefix encapsulation and bypassing the authentication hook. Applications whose private or tenant fallbacks return protected data from a not-found handler are affected. ### Patches Patched in fastify 5.12.2. Malformed URLs are now routed through the configured `onBadUrl` and `onMaxParamLength` handlers so they fail closed before any application not-found handler runs, and the shared not-found handler pointer has been removed. ### Workarounds Reject malformed request targets before they reach the application, for example at an upstream proxy or gateway, and do not rely on a not-found handler to serve protected data. A global `onRequest` authentication hook does not mitigate this, because the malformed-URL path skips it.
Recommended action
Recommended action
Upgrade affected packages to a patched version: fastify 5.12.2.
Technical details
- Vendor
- Not specified
- Product
- fastify
- Exploitation
- none known
- Evidence
- official
Evidence and sources
This record is attributed to GitHub Advisories. Exploitation status and remediation guidance are kept separate from the vulnerability's technical severity.
Open primary source