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CVE-2016-7983

31
FAUCET Score

CVE-2016-7983 describes a critical buffer overflow vulnerability in the BOOTP parser of tcpdump versions prior to 4.9.0. This flaw, rated 9.8 CVSS (Critical), allows unauthenticated attackers to remotely execute arbitrary code with high impact on confidentiality, integrity, and availability, requiring no user interaction. While no public exploit code or active exploitation has been confirmed, the vulnerability has garnered significant community discussion, indicating awareness and potential for future exploitation.

Impacted Technologies

VendorProductVersion(s)CPE
<= 4.8.1CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:a:tcpdump:tcpdump:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

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
3.94%
Probability of exploitation in next 30 days
EPSS Percentile
89.3%
Percentile rank of EPSS score among Peer Group
As of 2026-07-26
Model: v2026.06.15
This CVE's current EPSS score of 0.0394 is in the 82nd 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

Patch Available

Vendor Patches (3)

redhatpatch availablevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7Fixed in: tcpdump-14:4.9.0-5.el7
View patch
redhatend of lifevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5Fixed in: tcpdump
redhatend of lifevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6Fixed in: tcpdump

Vendor Advisories (1)

redhatCVE-2016-7983Moderate

tcpdump: multiple overflow issues in protocol decoding

Feb 2, 2017

References

access.redhat.com / errata/RHSA-2017:1871
security.gentoo.org / glsa/201702-30
mail-archive.com / debian-bugs-dist%40lists.debian.org/msg1494526.html
debian.org / security/2017/dsa-3775
securityfocus.com / bid/95852
Third Party AdvisoryVDB Entry
securitytracker.com / id/1037755