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Fencer Vulns
medium 5.5

CVE-2021-45944 json

Ghostscript GhostPDL 9.50 through 9.53.3 has a use-after-free in sampled_data_sample (called from sampled_data_continue and interp).

published 2021-12-31 4 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2021-32652

cvss
5.5
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
1.5%
EPSS 1.5% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 73%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

Ghostscript GhostPDL 9.50 through 9.53.3 has a use-after-free in sampled_data_sample (called from sampled_data_continue and interp).

Patch / fix

  • ghostscript Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 9.54.0~dfsg-5

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2021-45944

  • ghostscript Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 9.26~dfsg+0-0ubuntu0.18.04.15
  • ghostscript Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 9.50~dfsg-5ubuntu4.5
  • ghostscript Ubuntu Pro 16.04 LTS 9.26~dfsg+0-0ubuntu0.16.04.14+esm1

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2021-45944

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

  • ghostscript SLE Real Time 15 SP2, SLE Module for Basesystem 15 SP3, Enterprise Storage 7 +7 more 9.52-161.1
  • ghostscript SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5, SLE Software Development Kit 12 SP5 9.52-23.48.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2022:0088-3SUSE-SU-2022:0088-2SUSE-SU-2022:0088-1SUSE-SU-2022:0081-1

  • ghostscript openSUSE Tumbleweed 9.54.0-3.1
  • ghostscript openSUSE Leap 15.3 9.52-161.1
  • htmldoc Package Hub 12 SP1 1.8.28-9.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2024:11744-1openSUSE-SU-2022:0088-1

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-2021-45944 updated cvss 5.5

ghostscript: use-after-free in sampled_data_sample may lead to DoS

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 ghostscript, ghostscript-gtk Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 libgs, ghostscript, ghostscript-gtk, ghostscript-cups
    affected: no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 libgs, ghostscript, ghostscript-x11, ghostscript-tools-fonts, ghostscript-tools-dvipdf, ghostscript-tools-printing
    affected: no fix planned “Will not fix”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 libgs, ghostscript, ghostscript-x11, ghostscript-tools-fonts, ghostscript-tools-dvipdf, ghostscript-tools-printing
    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

1.46% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 73% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

Exploits and checks

  • bugs.chromium.org https://bugs.chromium.org/p/oss-fuzz/issues/detail?id=29903 referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.1 5.5 CVSS:3.1/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 Vulns 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.