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CVE-2017-15938

27
FAUCET Score

CVE-2017-15938 is a denial-of-service vulnerability affecting GNU Binutils 2.29, specifically within the Binary File Descriptor (BFD) library's dwarf2.c component. It stems from an incorrect calculation of DW_FORM_ref_addr die references in relocatable object files, leading to an invalid memory read and application crash. Rated High with a CVSS score of 7.5, this vulnerability can be exploited remotely with low attack complexity, resulting in a complete loss of availability. There is no evidence of active exploitation, nor are there any public exploits or significant community discussion surrounding this CVE.

Impacted Technologies

VendorProductVersion(s)CPE
2.29CPE matchmatch criteria
cpe:2.3:a:gnu:binutils:2.29:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

CVSS Data

CVSS version used by this source: 3.0

7.5HIGH

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

Attack Vector
NETWORK
Attack Complexity
LOW
Privileges Required
NONE
User Interaction
NONE
Scope
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality Impact
NONE
Integrity Impact
NONE
Availability Impact
HIGH
Exploitability Score
3.9
Impact Score
3.6
CvssVersion
3.0

Exploit Intelligence

EPSS Score
4.73%
Probability of exploitation in next 30 days
EPSS Percentile
90.9%
Percentile rank of EPSS score among Peer Group
As of 2026-07-27
Model: v2026.06.15
This CVE's current EPSS score of 0.0473 is in the 84th percentile among its peer group of 51,551 CVEs.

Social Chatter

The average CVE in this peer group has 0.0 Twitter, 0.0 Reddit, 0.1 Bluesky, 0.1 Mastodon, and 0.4 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

Vendor Patches (4)

redhatend of lifevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5Fixed in: binutils
redhatend of lifevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5Fixed in: binutils220
redhatend of lifevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6Fixed in: binutils
redhatend of lifevia redhat_api
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7Fixed in: binutils

Vendor Advisories (1)

redhatCVE-2017-15938Low

binutils: Invalid memory read in find_abstract_instance_name

Oct 24, 2017

References

blogs.gentoo.org / ago/2017/10/24/binutils-invalid-memory-read-in-find_abstract_instance_name-dwarf2-c
PatchThird Party AdvisoryVDB Entry
security.gentoo.org / glsa/201801-01
sourceware.org / bugzilla/show_bug.cgi
Issue TrackingPatchThird Party Advisory
sourceware.org / git/gitweb.cgi
securityfocus.com / bid/101610