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Fencer Intel
high 8.8

CVE-2016-4971 in the critical feed json

GNU wget before 1.18 allows remote servers to write to arbitrary files by redirecting a request from HTTP to a crafted FTP resource.

published 2016-06-30 10 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2016-5944

cvss
8.8
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
46.1%
EPSS 46.1% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 98%
public exploits
2
Exploit-DB

Summary

GNU wget before 1.18 allows remote servers to write to arbitrary files by redirecting a request from HTTP to a crafted FTP resource.

Patch / fix

  • gnu wget 1.18
  • wget Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 1.18-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2016-4971

  • wget Ubuntu 14.04 LTS 1.15-1ubuntu1.14.04.2
  • wget Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 1.17.1-1ubuntu1.1

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2016-4971

Ubuntu security data © Canonical Ltd., from https://github.com/canonical/ubuntu-security-notices via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • wget RHEL 7 1.14-13.el7

red hat advisories RHSA-2016:2587

  • wget SLES for SAP 11 SP4, SLES 11 SP4, SLES 11 SP3-TERADATA +5 more 1.11.4-1.32.1
  • wget-openssl1 SLES 11-SECURITY, SLES 11 SP3-TERADATA, SLES 11 SP3-LTSS 1.11.4-1.32.1
  • wget SLES for SAP 12 SP1, SLES 12 SP1, SLED 12 SP1 1.14-10.3

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2016:2358-1SUSE-SU-2016:2226-1

  • wget openSUSE Tumbleweed 1.18-2.3

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2024:10263-1

  • wget Alpine 3.4 1.17.1-r1

alpine advisories ALPINE-CVE-2016-4971

Alpine secdb © Alpine Linux, from https://secdb.alpinelinux.org via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2016-4971 updated cvss 7.0

wget: Lack of filename checking allows arbitrary file upload via FTP redirect

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 wget Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 wget
    affected: workaround, no fix planned “Use wget with "-O" option to explicitly specify the output filename.”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Client (v. 7) wget 1.14-13.el7 Red Hat Enterprise Linux ComputeNode (v. 7) wget 1.14-13.el7 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server (v. 7) wget 1.14-13.el7 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation (v. 7) wget 1.14-13.el7
    fixed: vendor fix “Use wget with "-O" option to explicitly specify the output filename.” RHSA-2016:2587

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

Timeline

  1. Published
  2. First public exploit (EDB-40064)

Exploit prediction

46.06% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 98% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

Exploits and checks

  • EDB-49815 GNU Wget < 1.18 - Arbitrary File Upload (2) remote, 2021-04-30
  • EDB-40064 GNU Wget < 1.18 - Arbitrary File Upload / Remote Code Execution remote, 2016-07-06
  • bugzilla.redhat.com https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1343666 referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified
  • packetstormsecurity.com http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/162395/GNU-wget-Arbitrary-File-Upload-Code-Execution.html referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.1 8.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
NVD 2.0 4.3 AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:N

Classification

Technology feeds

References

Sources

Fencer Intel keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.