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Fencer Vulns
high 7.8

CVE-2022-38223 json

There is an out-of-bounds write in checkType located in etc.c in w3m 0.5.3.

published 2022-08-15 4 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2022-40815

cvss
7.8
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 41%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

There is an out-of-bounds write in checkType located in etc.c in w3m 0.5.3. It can be triggered by sending a crafted HTML file to the w3m binary. It allows an attacker to cause Denial of Service or possibly have unspecified other impact.

Patch / fix

  • w3m Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 0.5.3+git20230121-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2022-38223

  • w3m Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 0.5.3-36ubuntu0.1
  • w3m Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 0.5.3-37ubuntu0.1
  • w3m Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 0.5.3+git20210102-6ubuntu0.1
  • w3m Ubuntu Pro 14.04 LTS 0.5.3-15ubuntu0.2+esm1

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2022-38223

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

  • w3m SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5 0.5.3.git20161120-161.6.1
  • w3m SLE Real Time 15 SP3, SLE Module for Basesystem 15 SP4, openSUSE Leap 15.4 0.5.3+git20180125-150000.3.3.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2023:0066-1SUSE-SU-2023:0065-1

  • w3m openSUSE Tumbleweed 0.5.3+git20180125-2.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2024:12612-1

  • w3m Alpine 3.17 0.5.3.20220429-r3
  • w3m Alpine 3.21, Alpine 3.20, Alpine 3.19 +1 more 0.5.3.20230121-r0
  • w3m Alpine 3.24, Alpine 3.23, Alpine 3.22 0.5.3_git20241203-r0

alpine advisories ALPINE-CVE-2022-38223

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-2022-38223 updated cvss 7.8

w3m: an out-of-bounds write in checkType located in etc.c in w3m

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 w3m, w3m-img
    affected: no fix planned “Out of support scope”

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

0.47% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 41% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

Exploits and checks

  • github.com https://github.com/tats/w3m/issues/242 referenced PoC, tagged "exploit" by a source, unverified

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
NVD 3.1 7.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

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.