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Fencer Vulns
high 7.8

CVE-2023-29491 json

ncurses before 6.4 20230408, when used by a setuid application, allows local users to trigger security-relevant memory corruption via malfo…

published 2023-04-14 3 y ago modified 2026-10-14 25 d ago also EUVD-2023-33058 , JLSEC-2026-453

cvss
7.8
version 3.1, NVD
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
1.0%
EPSS 1.0% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 62%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

ncurses before 6.4 20230408, when used by a setuid application, allows local users to trigger security-relevant memory corruption via malformed data in a terminfo database file that is found in $HOME/.terminfo or reached via the TERMINFO or TERM environment variable.

Patch / fix

  • julia Ncurses_jll 6.4.0+0
  • Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP V3.1.5
  • Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518F-4 PN/DP MFP V3.1.5
  • Siemens SIPLUS S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP V3.1.5
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX MX5000 V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX MX5000RE V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1400 V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1500 V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1501 V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1510 V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1511 V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1512 V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1524 V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1536 V2.17.0
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX5000 V2.17.0
  • ncurses Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 6.4-3

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2023-29491

  • ncurses Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 6.1-1ubuntu1.18.04.1
  • ncurses Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 6.2-0ubuntu2.1
  • ncurses Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 6.3-2ubuntu0.1
  • ncurses Ubuntu Pro 14.04 LTS 5.9+20140118-1ubuntu1+esm3
  • ncurses Ubuntu Pro 16.04 LTS 6.0+20160213-1ubuntu1+esm3

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2023-29491

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

  • ncurses RHEL 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses-base RHEL 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses-libs RHEL 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses-term RHEL 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses-c++-libs RHEL 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses RHEL 8 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1
  • ncurses-base RHEL 8 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1
  • ncurses-libs RHEL 8 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1

red hat advisories RHSA-2024:0416RHSA-2023:7361RHSA-2023:6698RHSA-2023:5249

  • ncurses SLES for SAP 12 SP5, SLES 12 SP5, SLE Software Development Kit 12 SP5 5.9-81.1
  • ncurses SLE Real Time 15 SP3, SLE Module for Legacy 15 SP4, SLE Module for Development Tools 15 SP4 +7 more 6.1-150000.5.15.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2023:2112-1SUSE-SU-2023:2111-1

  • ncurses AlmaLinux 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses-base AlmaLinux 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses-libs AlmaLinux 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses-term AlmaLinux 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses-c++-libs AlmaLinux 9 6.2-10.20210508.el9
  • ncurses AlmaLinux 8 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1
  • ncurses-base AlmaLinux 8 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1
  • ncurses-libs AlmaLinux 8 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1

almalinux advisories ALSA-2023:6698ALSA-2023:5249

  • ncurses Alpine 3.15 6.3_p20211120-r2
  • ncurses Alpine 3.16 6.3_p20220521-r1
  • ncurses Alpine 3.17 6.3_p20221119-r1
  • ncurses Alpine 3.24, Alpine 3.23, Alpine 3.22 +3 more 6.4_p20230424-r0

alpine advisories ALPINE-CVE-2023-29491

Alpine secdb © Alpine Linux, from https://secdb.alpinelinux.org via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • ncurses CBL-Mariner 2.0 6.4-1

azure linux advisories AZL-26241

Azure Linux vulnerability data, Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation, from https://github.com/microsoft/AzureLinuxVulnerabilityData via OSV, under the MIT licence; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. MIT

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-2023-29491 updated cvss 7.8

ncurses: Local users can trigger security-relevant memory corruption via malformed data

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 ncurses, ncurses-base, ncurses-libs, ncurses-term Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 ncurses, ncurses-base, ncurses-libs, ncurses-term
    affected: no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux AppStream (v. 9) ncurses-term 6.2-10.20210508.el9, ncurses-c++-libs 6.2-10.20210508.el9
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2023:6698
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux AppStream EUS (v.9.2) ncurses-term 6.2-8.20210508.el9_2.1, ncurses-c++-libs 6.2-8.20210508.el9_2.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2023:7361
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux BaseOS (v. 8) ncurses 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1, ncurses-base 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1, ncurses-libs 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1, ncurses-term 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1, ncurses-c++-libs 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1, ncurses-compat-libs 6.1-9.20180224.el8_8.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2023:5249
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux BaseOS (v. 9) ncurses 6.2-10.20210508.el9, ncurses-base 6.2-10.20210508.el9, ncurses-libs 6.2-10.20210508.el9
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2023:6698
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux BaseOS EUS (v.8.6) ncurses 6.1-9.20180224.el8_6.1, ncurses-base 6.1-9.20180224.el8_6.1, ncurses-libs 6.1-9.20180224.el8_6.1, ncurses-term 6.1-9.20180224.el8_6.1, ncurses-c++-libs 6.1-9.20180224.el8_6.1, ncurses-compat-libs 6.1-9.20180224.el8_6.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2024:0416
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux BaseOS EUS (v.9.2) ncurses 6.2-8.20210508.el9_2.1, ncurses-base 6.2-8.20210508.el9_2.1, ncurses-libs 6.2-8.20210508.el9_2.1
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2023:7361

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

cisa ICSA-23-348-10 updated cvss 7.8

Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500

  • Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4AX00-1AB0) >= 3.1.0, < 3.1.5 Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4AX00-1AC0) >= 3.1.0, < 3.1.5 Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518F-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4FX00-1AB0) >= 3.1.0, < 3.1.5 Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518F-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4FX00-1AC0) >= 3.1.0, < 3.1.5 Siemens SIPLUS S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP (6AG1518-4AX00-4AC0) >= 3.1.0, < 3.1.5
    affected: fixed in V3.1.5, mitigation support.industry.siemens.com

Facts from CISA's republication of the vendor's own advisory (CSAF); the linked advisory is the authoritative source. CISA notification · csaf

CISA SSVC

Exploitation
none
Automatable
no
Technical impact
total
Assessed
23 mo ago

Exploit prediction

0.98% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 62% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-08).

Exploits and checks

  • openwall.com http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2023/04/19/11 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:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
OSV 3.1 7.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Affected packages

ecosystem package affected fixed in
julia Ncurses_jll
<6.4.0+0
6.4.0+0

Affected products

  • Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP
  • Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518F-4 PN/DP MFP
  • Siemens SIPLUS S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX MX5000
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX MX5000RE
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1400
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1500
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1501
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1510
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1511
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1512
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1524
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX1536
  • Siemens RUGGEDCOM ROX RX5000

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.