CVE-2026-34068CWE-347

nimiq-transaction: UpdateValidator transactions allows voting key change without proof-of-knowledge

Medium · published April 22, 2026

CVSS v3.1
6.8
EPSS
0%
Percentile
17.2
In the wild
Unconfirmed
What it is

nimiq-transaction provides the transaction primitive to be used in Nimiq's Rust implementation. Prior to version 1.3.0, the staking contract accepts `UpdateValidator` transactions that set `new_voting_key=Some(...)` while omitting `new_proof_of_knowledge`. this skips the proof-of-knowledge requirement that is needed to prevent BLS rogue-key attacks when public keys are aggregated. Because tendermint macro block justification verification aggregates validator voting keys and verifies a single aggregated BLS signature against that aggregate public key, a rogue-key voting key in the validator set can allow an attacker to forge a quorum-looking justification while only producing a single signature. While the impact is critical, the exploitability is low: The voting keys are fixed for the epoch, so the attacker would need to know the next epoch validator set (chosen through VRF), which is unlikely. The patch for this vulnerability is included as part of v1.3.0. No known workarounds are available.

The record
Technical detail
CVSS v3.1
6.8 · MEDIUM
Vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:H/A:N
CVSS v4.0
Not supplied
EPSS
0.00263 · 17.2th percentile
Weakness
CWE-347 · Improper Verification of Cryptographic Signature
Published
2026-04-22T19:55Z
EPSS history
Timeline
  • 22 APR 19:55Z
    nimiq-transaction: UpdateValidator transactions allows voting key change without proof-of-knowledge
    cvelistv5