Cisco Secure Email S/MIME Decryption Weakness Enables Plaintext Leakage
CVE-2026-20355 Published on September 2, 2026

Cisco Secure Email S/MIME Ciphertext Decryption Vulnerabilty
Multiple vulnerabilities in the Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (S/MIME) decryption functionality of Cisco Secure Email could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to recover plain text from encrypted email messages. These vulnerabilities are due to insufficient validation of message integrity. An attacker could exploit these vulnerabilities by using a machine-in-the-middle technique to intercept and modify traffic between email gateways. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to obtain plaintext content from the encrypted communication.

NVD

Vulnerability Analysis

CVE-2026-20355 can be exploited with network access, and does not require authorization privileges or user interaction. This vulnerability is consided to have a high level of attack complexity. The potential impact of an exploit of this vulnerability is considered to have a high impact on confidentiality, with no impact on integrity and availability.

Attack Vector:
NETWORK
Attack Complexity:
HIGH
Privileges Required:
NONE
User Interaction:
NONE
Scope:
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality Impact:
HIGH
Integrity Impact:
NONE
Availability Impact:
NONE

Weakness Type

Insufficient Verification of Data Authenticity

The software does not sufficiently verify the origin or authenticity of data, in a way that causes it to accept invalid data.


Affected Versions

Cisco Secure Email: