Cyber ·
Oss-sec discussion on OpenSSH password authentication with musl libc
A security mailing list post questions whether the password authentication bypass in OpenSSH with musl libc works without a reusable salt and raises a possible leak about whether any account has a valid password.
This Radar item is a thread from the oss-sec mailing list, published by the feed on 7 November 2026 and marked as an automatic translation. The original message was posted by Jacob Bachmeyer on 6 November. The stated scope is the behavior of password authentication in OpenSSH when built with musl libc, described in the title as a bypass of password authentication.
The available content is a question, not a consolidated advisory. The author asks whether the bypass works completely when no salt is available to reuse. He also suggests that sshd may generate a fake salt or fail authentication quickly, which would reveal whether any account on the machine has a valid password. According to the excerpt, the assumption that a salt exists dates from an earlier period and has become weaker with cloud virtual machine images that lack a console and are reachable only through SSH key login.
The excerpt does not give affected versions, fixes, a vulnerability identifier or technical confirmation of the leak. Those details should be checked in the replies within the thread itself and in the advisories from vendors or distributions.
For an organization, the relevance is checking whether its servers run OpenSSH with musl libc and whether password authentication is enabled on exposed hosts. To consult and verify, open the original thread through the link in the Radar entry, read the later replies, and compare with the advisories from the distribution you use.
Rota Nacional does not fix OpenSSH and does not assess this vulnerability. Its role here is only to support studying the material with data protection.
Original source: Re: “sshole”: desvio da autenticação por senha no OpenSSH com musl libc