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Fencer Vulns
medium 5.5

CVE-2017-14938 json

_bfd_elf_slurp_version_tables in elf.c in the Binary File Descriptor (BFD) library (aka libbfd), as distributed in GNU Binutils 2.29, allow…

published 2017-09-29 9 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2017-6415

cvss
5.5
version 3.0, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
2.0%
EPSS 2.0% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 81%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

_bfd_elf_slurp_version_tables in elf.c in the Binary File Descriptor (BFD) library (aka libbfd), as distributed in GNU Binutils 2.29, allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (excessive memory allocation and application crash) via a crafted ELF file.

Patch / fix

  • binutils Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 2.29.90.20180122-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2017-14938

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

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2017-14938

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

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-2017-14938 updated cvss 3.3

binutils: Excessive memory allocation in _bfd_elf_slurp_version_tables

  • 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

2.02% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 81% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

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
  • CWE-770 Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling

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.