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CVE-2016-10243

34
FAUCET Score

CVE-2016-10243 describes a critical vulnerability in TeX Live, affecting various Debian and Fedora distributions, where remote attackers can execute arbitrary commands. This is due to the inclusion of mpost in shell_escape_commands within the texmf.cnf configuration file. With a CVSS score of 9.8 (Critical), the vulnerability is easily exploitable over a network with no user interaction, leading to complete compromise of confidentiality, integrity, and availability. Despite its high severity, there is no evidence of active exploitation, nor are there publicly available exploit modules in Metasploit, Nuclei, or ExploitDB, and it has received no community discussion or media coverage.

Impacted Technologies

VendorProductVersion(s)CPE
7.0CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:7.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
8.0CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:8.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
25CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:25:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
26CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:26:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
Range not provided by sourceCPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:a:tug:tex_live:-:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

CVSS Data

CVSS version used by this source: 3.0

9.8CRITICAL

CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Attack Vector
NETWORK
Attack Complexity
LOW
Privileges Required
NONE
User Interaction
NONE
Scope
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality Impact
HIGH
Integrity Impact
HIGH
Availability Impact
HIGH
Exploitability Score
3.9
Impact Score
5.9
CvssVersion
3.0

Exploit Intelligence

EPSS Score
7.15%
Probability of exploitation in next 30 days
EPSS Percentile
93.6%
Percentile rank of EPSS score among Peer Group
As of 2026-07-24
Model: v2026.06.15
This CVE's current EPSS score of 0.0715 is in the 89th percentile among its peer group of 36,829 CVEs.

Social Chatter

The average CVE in this peer group has 0.0 Twitter, 0.1 Reddit, 0.3 Bluesky, 0.3 Mastodon, and 2.4 GitHub mentions.

Media Mentions

No media coverage found for this CVE.

The average CVE in this peer group has 0.3 InfoSec Media, 0.0 Vendor Blog, and 0.0 Security Researcher mentions.

Remediation

Vendor Patches (1)

redhatend of lifevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7Fixed in: texlive

Vendor Advisories (1)

redhatCVE-2016-10243Moderate

texlive: mpost allows to run non-whitelisted external programs

Nov 28, 2016

References

lists.fedoraproject.org / archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/B7CNJ4HKX7X6V7VMN3UCU7KPY6IX4XRB
lists.fedoraproject.org / archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/VL6PUKPWEXYIPIAZRIX5ZLQWCSALVLFP
scumjr.github.io / 2016/11/28/pwning-coworkers-thanks-to-latex
ExploitTechnical DescriptionThird Party Advisory
security.gentoo.org / glsa/201709-07
tug.org / svn/texlive
PatchVendor Advisory
debian.org / security/2017/dsa-3803
Third Party Advisory
openwall.com / lists/oss-security/2017/03/05/1
Mailing ListThird Party Advisory
securityfocus.com / bid/96593
Third Party AdvisoryVDB Entry