libsylph/utils.c in Sylpheed through 3.6 does not validate strings before launching the program specified by the BROWSER environment variab…

published 2017-12-14 8 y ago modified 2026-06-17 4 mo ago also EUVD-2017-8677

cvss: 8.8; version 3.0, NVD
cisa kev: Not listed; not in CISA's catalog
epss: 1.2%; EPSS 1.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 68%
public exploits: 0; none known

libsylph/utils.c in Sylpheed through 3.6 does not validate strings before launching the program specified by the BROWSER environment variable, which might allow remote attackers to conduct argument-injection attacks via a crafted URL.

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-2017-17517 updated 2025-11-21 cvss 5.3

sylpheed: Command injection in libsylph/utils.c

Red Hat All currently supported Red Hat products
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

1.22% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 68% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

CVSS scores

assigned by	version	score	vector
NVD	3.0	8.8	CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
NVD	2.0	6.8	AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P

Classification

Weakness

CWE-74 Improper Neutralization of Special Elements in Output Used by a Downstream Component

References

security-tracker.debian.org /tracker/CVE-2017-17517
issue-tracking, third-party-advisory

Sources

CVE List CVE-2017-17517
NVD CVE-2017-17517

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.

Summary