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CVE-2017-6542

54
FAUCET Score

CVE-2017-6542 is a critical buffer overflow vulnerability in PuTTY before version 0.68, specifically within the ssh_agent_channel_data function, affecting various openSUSE and PuTTY distributions. This flaw allows remote attackers to achieve high impact on confidentiality, integrity, and availability by sending a large length value in an agent protocol message and connecting to the Unix-domain socket of a forwarded agent connection. With a CVSS score of 9.8, it is easily exploitable over the network with low attack complexity and no user interaction required. While not listed on CISA's KEV catalog, an exploit (EDB-42137) is publicly available, though there is no evidence of active exploitation, Metasploit modules, or significant community discussion or media coverage.

Impacted Technologies

VendorProductVersion(s)CPE
<= 0.67CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:a:putty:putty:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
42.2CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:o:opensuse:leap:42.2:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
42.1CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:o:opensuse_project:leap:42.1:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

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
21.82%
Probability of exploitation in next 30 days
EPSS Percentile
97.4%
Percentile rank of EPSS score among Peer Group
As of 2026-07-25
Model: v2026.06.15
ExploitDB: EDB-42137 · Jun 7, 2017
This CVE's current EPSS score of 0.2182 is in the 94th percentile among its peer group of 36,833 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

Remediation records are not available for this CVE.

References

lists.opensuse.org / opensuse-updates/2017-03/msg00055.html
Third Party Advisory
git.tartarus.org
security.gentoo.org / glsa/201703-03
Third Party AdvisoryVDB Entry
security.gentoo.org / glsa/201706-09
exploit-db.com / exploits/42137
chiark.greenend.org.uk / ~sgtatham/putty/wishlist/vuln-agent-fwd-overflow.html
PatchVendor Advisory
securityfocus.com / bid/97156
Third Party AdvisoryVDB Entry
securitytracker.com / id/1038067