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CVE-2016-7977

22
FAUCET Score

CVE-2016-7977 describes a vulnerability in Ghostscript before version 9.21 that allows remote attackers to bypass the SAFER mode protection. By crafting a malicious PostScript document utilizing the .libfile operator, an attacker could read arbitrary files on the system. This vulnerability has a CVSS score of 5.5 (Medium), indicating a local attack vector with low complexity, requiring user interaction, and potentially leading to high confidentiality impact. There is no evidence of active exploitation, public exploit code (Metasploit, Nuclei, ExploitDB), or significant community discussion or media coverage surrounding this CVE.

Impacted Technologies

VendorProductVersion(s)CPE
<= 9.20CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:a:artifex:ghostscript:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

CVSS Data

CVSS version used by this source: 3.0

5.5MEDIUM

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

Attack Vector
LOCAL
Attack Complexity
LOW
Privileges Required
NONE
User Interaction
REQUIRED
Scope
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality Impact
HIGH
Integrity Impact
NONE
Availability Impact
NONE
Exploitability Score
1.8
Impact Score
3.6
CvssVersion
3.0

Exploit Intelligence

EPSS Score
4.57%
Probability of exploitation in next 30 days
EPSS Percentile
90.6%
Percentile rank of EPSS score among Peer Group
As of 2026-07-25
Model: v2026.06.15
This CVE's current EPSS score of 0.0457 is in the 97th percentile among its peer group of 5,758 CVEs.

Social Chatter

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

Media Mentions

No media coverage found for this CVE.

The average CVE in this peer group has 0.1 InfoSec Media, 0.0 Vendor Blog, and 0.0 Security Researcher mentions.

Remediation

Patch Available

Vendor Patches (4)

redhatpatch availablevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6Fixed in: ghostscript-0:8.70-21.el6_8.1
View patch
redhatpatch availablevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7Fixed in: ghostscript-0:9.07-20.el7_3.1
View patch
redhatend of lifevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5Fixed in: ghostscript
redhatend of lifevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat OpenShift Enterprise 2Fixed in: ghostscript

Vendor Advisories (1)

redhatCVE-2016-7977Moderate

ghostscript: .libfile does not honor -dSAFER

Sep 28, 2016

References

git.ghostscript.com
rhn.redhat.com / errata/RHSA-2017-0013.html
rhn.redhat.com / errata/RHSA-2017-0014.html
bugs.ghostscript.com / show_bug.cgi
Issue TrackingPatch
ghostscript.com / doc/9.21/History9.htm
Release Notes
security.gentoo.org / glsa/201702-31
debian.org / security/2016/dsa-3691
openwall.com / lists/oss-security/2016/09/29/28
Mailing ListPatch
openwall.com / lists/oss-security/2016/10/05/15
Mailing ListPatch
oracle.com / technetwork/security-advisory/cpujan2018-3236628.html
securityfocus.com / bid/95334
Third Party AdvisoryVDB Entry