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Fencer Intel
low 3.3

CVE-2020-14354 json

A possible use-after-free and double-free in c-ares lib version 1.16.0 if ares_destroy() is called prior to ares_getaddrinfo() completing.

published 5y ago modified 4mo ago also EUVD-2020-6498

cvss
3.3
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.5%
EPSS 0.5% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 45%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

A possible use-after-free and double-free in c-ares lib version 1.16.0 if ares_destroy() is called prior to ares_getaddrinfo() completing. This flaw possibly allows an attacker to crash the service that uses c-ares lib. The highest threat from this vulnerability is to this service availability.

Patch / fix

  • c-ares Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 1.16.1-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2020-14354

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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-2020-14354 updated cvss 5.9

c-ares: ares_destroy() with pending ares_getaddrinfo() leads to Use-After-Free

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 c-ares Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 c-ares Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 c-ares Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 npm, c-ares, nodejs, nodejs-libs, nodejs-nodemon, nodejs-full-i18n, +2 more Red Hat Software Collections rh-nodejs10-npm, rh-nodejs12-npm, rh-nodejs10-nodejs, rh-nodejs12-nodejs
    not affected: vulnerable code not present

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

0.53% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 45% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

Exploits and checks

  • bugzilla.redhat.com https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1866838 referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified
  • packetstormsecurity.com https://packetstormsecurity.com/files/158755/GS20200804145053.txt referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.1 3.3 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L
NVD 2.0 2.1 AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P

Affected products

  • n/a c-ares

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.