CVE-2023-49991

Description

A flaw was found in the espeak-ng package. A local attacker can use a specially crafted payload to trigger a buffer underflow condition, which may lead to an application crash or allow for arbitrary code execution.

Mitigation

Mitigation for this issue is either not available or the currently available options do not meet the Red Hat Product Security criteria comprising ease of use and deployment, applicability to widespread installation base or stability.

Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details

Info alert:Important note

CVSS scores for open source components depend on vendor-specific factors (e.g. version or build chain). Therefore, Red Hat's score and impact rating can be different from NVD and other vendors. Red Hat remains the authoritative CVE Naming Authority (CNA) source for its products and services (see Red Hat classifications).

The following CVSS metrics and score provided are preliminary and subject to review.

CVSS v3 Score Breakdown

Red HatNVDcve.org
Base Score5.35.3N/A
Attack VectorLocalLocalN/A
Attack ComplexityLowLowN/A
Privileges RequiredNoneNoneN/A
User InteractionRequiredRequiredN/A
ScopeUnchangedUnchangedN/A
ConfidentialityLowLowN/A
Integrity ImpactLowLowN/A
Availability ImpactLowLowN/A

Vector

Red Hat: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L

NVD: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L

Red Hat CVSS v3 Score Explanation

Successfully exploiting espeak-ng results in some confidentiality loss, but the attacker can't control what information is accessed, limiting the impact. This disclosure doesn't cause a direct, serious loss to the affected component, so confidentiality impact is low.

After exploiting espeak-ng, data modification is possible, but the attacker lacks control over the consequences or extent, resulting in a low integrity impact as the modification doesn't directly and severely affect the component.

While resource availability experiences reduced performance, repeated exploitation doesn't allow the attacker to completely deny service to legitimate users. The impacted component's resources are either partially available consistently or fully available intermittently, resulting in a low availability impact overall.

Understanding the Weakness (CWE)

Integrity,Availability

Technical Impact: Modify Memory; DoS: Crash, Exit, or Restart

Out of bounds memory access will very likely result in the corruption of relevant memory, and perhaps instructions, possibly leading to a crash.

Integrity,Confidentiality,Availability,Access Control,Other

Technical Impact: Execute Unauthorized Code or Commands; Modify Memory; Bypass Protection Mechanism; Other

If the corrupted memory can be effectively controlled, it may be possible to execute arbitrary code. If the corrupted memory is data rather than instructions, the system will continue to function with improper changes, possibly in violation of an implicit or explicit policy. The consequences would only be limited by how the affected data is used, such as an adjacent memory location that is used to specify whether the user has special privileges.

Access Control,Other

Technical Impact: Bypass Protection Mechanism; Other

When the consequence is arbitrary code execution, this can often be used to subvert any other security service.

Frequently Asked Questions

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