Excessive CPU Usage Vulnerability in OpenTelemetry-Go by OpenTelemetry
CVE-2026-81872

6.3MEDIUM

Key Information:

Vendor

Open-telemetry

Status
Opentelemetry-go
Vendor
CVE Published:
16 September 2026

What is CVE-2026-81872?

The OpenTelemetry-Go implementation experienced a resource exhaustion vulnerability in the BatchingProcessor component. When attacker-driven log emissions overwhelm the asynchronous export buffer during backpressure, the processor enters a tight CPU loop, leading to excessive CPU usage. This continuous retry behavior may degrade service or even deny access entirely to the embedding application. This vulnerability has been addressed in version 0.21.0 of OpenTelemetry-Go.

Affected Version(s)

opentelemetry-go < 0.21.0

References

https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-go/securi...
x_refsource_CONFIRM
https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-go/issues...
x_refsource_MISC
https://github.com/open-telemetry/opentelemetry-go/pull/8620
x_refsource_MISC

CVSS V4

Score:
6.3
Severity:
MEDIUM
Confidentiality:
None
Integrity:
None
Availability:
Low
Attack Vector:
Network
Attack Complexity:
Low
Attack Required:
Physical
Privileges Required:
Undefined
User Interaction:
None

Timeline

  • Vulnerability published

  • Vulnerability Reserved

.