CVE-2017-14939

medium

Published 2017-09-30 · Modified 2026-05-13

💬 Discuss on Community ✚ Propose mitigation

CVSS v3

5.5

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

CVSS v4 NEW

—

not yet in upstream

VIR risk

6.5

Description

decode_line_info in dwarf2.c in the Binary File Descriptor (BFD) library (aka libbfd), as distributed in GNU Binutils 2.29, mishandles a length calculation, which allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (heap-based buffer over-read and application crash) via a crafted ELF file, related to read_1_byte.

Predictions

Exploit likelihood

55%

Patch ETA

—

Heuristic predictions, AS-IS, for prioritization only.

Mitigations

No mitigations published for this CVE yet.

The vendor-content worker queues fetches as references arrive (check back in a few minutes). Or — if you've already worked around this in production — publish your fix to the community-verified tier.

✚ Propose a mitigation on Community → Mitigations published via the community go through AI scoring + 2 human reviewers + 7-day silent objection window before landing here with source_tier=community-verified.

Exploits

Public proof-of-concept code below. AS-IS, for defenders and authorised testing only.

Exploit-DB

EDB-42970 dos linux

Agostino Sarubbo · 2017-10-10

binutils 2.29.51.20170921 - 'read_1_byte' Heap Buffer Overflow

Source code queued for fetch — refresh in a moment.

OS impact

OS	Version	Status	Fixed in
debian	bookworm	fixed	`2.29.90.20180122-1`
debian	bullseye	fixed	`2.29.90.20180122-1`
debian	forky	fixed	`2.29.90.20180122-1`
debian	sid	fixed	`2.29.90.20180122-1`
debian	trixie	fixed	`2.29.90.20180122-1`
sles		affected

Application impact

Vendor	Product	Versions	Fixed
gnu	binutils	`2.29`

References

CWEs

CWE-125

Community-verified mitigations for this CVE will appear above when contributors publish them.

Verify integrity in audit chain (admin only). AS-IS.