CVE-2026-78655

Technical Description

Punk::Plugin::TOTP versions before 0.05 for Perl allow the second-factor attempt limit to be reset by replaying an earlier session cookie because the challenge route counts failures in the session.

The POST handler on challenge_path keeps the failure count as tries inside the totp_pending record in the session, raising it on each rejected code and deleting the pending record once it reaches attempts, five by default. Punk::Session carries the session in a signed cookie unless the application declares a store, and keeps no server-side record, so an earlier value of the same session stays valid until the expiry stamped inside it. A client that saves the cookie before its failed attempts and presents it again gets the pending record back with its counter, and the limit never fires. The replayed record is accepted while its own expiry, pending_ttl seconds from the challenge and 300 by default, has not passed.

Sessions declared with a store are not affected: the pending record and its cou

Remediation

Check the references section for vendor advisories, patches, and mitigation guidance. If immediate patching is not possible, review the CVSS vector to understand the attack surface and apply compensating controls such as network segmentation or access restrictions.

References