CVE-2026-85443

MOOS core-moos through 10.4.0 contains an unauthenticated denial-of-service flaw in MOOSCommServer::ListenLoop(): during the TCP wire-protocol handshake, the accept thread performs a blocking receive with no timeout. An attacker who can open a TCP connection to the MOOSDB port and simply sends nothing keeps the accept thread blocked indefinitely while it holds the socket-list lock. Because that lock is needed to accept new clients, every subsequent connection attempt is blocked, effectively halting the MOOSDB communications hub and any processes that depend on it (high availability impact, CVSS 4.0 8.7). Affected users are operators of MOOS-based robotics and autonomy systems—typically academic, marine, and research deployments—whose MOOSDB port is reachable by untrusted network peers. No public proof-of-concept, KEV listing, or confirmed in-the-wild exploitation is known, and EPSS currently estimates roughly a 0.4% chance of exploitation within 30 days.

What to do: Restrict network access to the MOOSDB TCP port so only trusted hosts (e.g., onboard or lab-network clients) can connect, and verify no untrusted peers can reach it. Upgrade to a release newer than 10.4.0 when a fixed version is published by the vendor, and in the meantime monitor for idle/stalled TCP connections to MOOSDB, which is the signature of this DoS.