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Fencer Intel
medium 6.5

CVE-2018-20481 json

XRef::getEntry in XRef.cc in Poppler 0.72.0 mishandles unallocated XRef entries, which allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service…

published 2018-12-26 7 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2018-13035

cvss
6.5
version 3.0, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
3.3%
EPSS 3.3% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 88%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

XRef::getEntry in XRef.cc in Poppler 0.72.0 mishandles unallocated XRef entries, which allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (NULL pointer dereference) via a crafted PDF document, when XRefEntry::setFlag in XRef.h is called from Parser::makeStream in Parser.cc.

Patch / fix

  • poppler Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 0.71.0-4

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2018-20481

  • poppler Ubuntu 14.04 LTS 0.24.5-2ubuntu4.15
  • poppler Ubuntu 16.04 LTS 0.41.0-0ubuntu1.11
  • poppler Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 0.62.0-2ubuntu2.6

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2018-20481

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

  • poppler RHEL 8 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12
  • poppler-cpp RHEL 8 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12
  • poppler-qt5 RHEL 8 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12
  • poppler-glib RHEL 8 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12
  • poppler-utils RHEL 8 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12
  • poppler RHEL 7 0.26.5-38.el7
  • evince RHEL 7 3.28.2-8.el7
  • okular RHEL 7 4.10.5-7.el7

red hat advisories RHSA-2019:2713RHSA-2019:2022

  • poppler SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5, SLE Software Development Kit 12 SP5 0.43.0-16.25.1
  • poppler-qt SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5, SLE Software Development Kit 12 SP5 0.43.0-16.25.1
  • poppler SLE Software Development Kit 12 SP5 0.24.4-14.26.1
  • poppler SLES for SAP 15 SP1, SLES for SAP 15, SLES 15-LTSS +8 more 0.62.0-4.6.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2023:2907-1SUSE-SU-2023:2906-1SUSE-SU-2021:3854-1

  • poppler openSUSE Leap 15.3 0.62.0-4.6.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2021:3854-1

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-2018-20481 updated cvss 3.3

poppler: NULL pointer dereference in the XRef::getEntry in XRef.cc

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 poppler Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 poppler, poppler-qt, poppler-qt4, poppler-glib, poppler-utils
    affected: no fix planned “Will not fix”
  • Red Hat CodeReady Linux Builder (v. 8) poppler-cpp 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12, poppler-qt5 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12 Red Hat Enterprise Linux AppStream (v. 8) poppler 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12, poppler-glib 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12, poppler-utils 0.66.0-11.el8_0.12
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2713
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux Client (v. 7) evince 3.28.2-8.el7, okular 4.10.5-7.el7, poppler 0.26.5-38.el7, evince-dvi 3.28.2-8.el7, evince-libs 3.28.2-8.el7, okular-libs 4.10.5-7.el7, +5 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux Client Optional (v. 7) poppler-cpp 0.26.5-38.el7, poppler-demos 0.26.5-38.el7, evince-browser-plugin 3.28.2-8.el7 Red Hat Enterprise Linux ComputeNode (v. 7) poppler 0.26.5-38.el7, poppler-qt 0.26.5-38.el7, poppler-utils 0.26.5-38.el7 Red Hat Enterprise Linux ComputeNode Optional (v. 7) poppler-cpp 0.26.5-38.el7, poppler-glib 0.26.5-38.el7, poppler-demos 0.26.5-38.el7 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server (v. 7) evince 3.28.2-8.el7, okular 4.10.5-7.el7, poppler 0.26.5-38.el7, evince-dvi 3.28.2-8.el7, evince-libs 3.28.2-8.el7, okular-libs 4.10.5-7.el7, +5 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server Optional (v. 7) poppler-qt 0.26.5-38.el7, poppler-cpp 0.26.5-38.el7, poppler-demos 0.26.5-38.el7, evince-browser-plugin 3.28.2-8.el7
    +2 more products
    Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation (v. 7) evince 3.28.2-8.el7, okular 4.10.5-7.el7, poppler 0.26.5-38.el7, evince-dvi 3.28.2-8.el7, evince-libs 3.28.2-8.el7, okular-libs 4.10.5-7.el7, +5 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation Optional (v. 7) poppler-cpp 0.26.5-38.el7, poppler-demos 0.26.5-38.el7, evince-browser-plugin 3.28.2-8.el7
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2019:2022

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

3.29% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 88% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

Exploits and checks

  • gitlab.freedesktop.org https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/poppler/poppler/issues/692 referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.0 6.5 CVSS:3.0/AV:N/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.