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Fencer Intel
medium 5.5

CVE-2017-15939 json

dwarf2.c in the Binary File Descriptor (BFD) library (aka libbfd), as distributed in GNU Binutils 2.29, mishandles NULL files in a .debug_l…

published 2017-10-27 9 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2017-7355

cvss
5.5
version 3.0, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
1.7%
EPSS 1.7% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 77%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

dwarf2.c in the Binary File Descriptor (BFD) library (aka libbfd), as distributed in GNU Binutils 2.29, mishandles NULL files in a .debug_line file table, which allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (NULL pointer dereference and application crash) via a crafted ELF file, related to concat_filename. NOTE: this issue is caused by an incomplete fix for CVE-2017-15023.

Patch / fix

  • binutils Ubuntu Pro 16.04 LTS 2.26.1-1ubuntu1~16.04.8+esm1

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2017-15939

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

  • binutils SLES 12 SP3, SLES 12 SP2-BCL, SLED 12 SP3 +9 more 2.31-9.26.1
  • cross-ppc-binutils SLE Software Development Kit 12 SP3 2.31-9.26.1
  • cross-spu-binutils SLE Software Development Kit 12 SP3 2.31-9.26.1
  • binutils SLE Module for Development Tools 15, SLE Module for Basesystem 15 2.31-6.3.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2018:3207-2SUSE-SU-2018:3207-1SUSE-SU-2018:3170-1

  • binutils openSUSE Tumbleweed 2.37-1.3

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2024:10651-1

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-2017-15939 updated cvss 3.3

binutils: NULL pointer dereference in the concat_filename

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 binutils, binutils220 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 binutils Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 binutils
    affected: no fix planned “Will not fix”

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

Exploit prediction

1.72% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 77% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.0 5.5 CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
NVD 2.0 4.3 AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P

Classification

Weakness

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.