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GdmApplication · Gnome

CVE-2000-0491

HIGH · 10.0 CVSS v2.0 Published 2000-05-24
Patch available
A vendor patch is available. No clean upgrade release — apply the published patch.
See remediation →
100/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
Remotely reachable No privileges Zero-click Patch available

Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.

NVD · unedited
Buffer overflow in the XDMCP parsing code of GNOME gdm, KDE kdm, and wdm allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary commands or cause a denial of service via a long FORWARD_QUERY request.

Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.

dbcve analysis

A detailed technical summary for this CVE is being prepared.

Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.

NVD · CPE data
GdmApplication
Affected:= 1.0
OpenlinuxOperating system
Affected:all versions
Suse LinuxOperating system
Affected:= 6.2= 6.4

CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.

From the vector
Attack vector
Network
Complexity
Low
Authentication
None
Confidentiality
Complete
Integrity
Complete
Availability
Complete

AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C

Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.

dbcve · scoped
Patch available Apply the vendor patch
Vendor patch ftp.calderasystems.com →
Recommended fix High confidence

Upgrade to current versions of gdm3 (modern GNOME), kdm (modern KDE), or wdm - the vulnerability was patched in subsequent releases of these display managers years ago. For old Caldera OpenLinux systems, apply the vendor patch CSSA-2000-013.0.txt from Caldera.

  1. 1. Identify the display manager in use (gdm, kdm, or wdm) by checking /etc/X11/default-display-manager or reviewing installed packages
  2. 2. For modern Linux systems, update the display manager package to the latest version available in your distribution's repositories (e.g., apt-get update && apt-get upgrade for Debian/Ubuntu, or yum update for RHEL/CentOS)
  3. 3. For legacy systems still running the affected versions, back up configuration files in /etc/gdm/ or /etc/kdm/ before upgrading
  4. 4. Restart the display manager (service gdm restart, service kdm restart, or service wdm restart) or reboot the system after upgrade
  5. 5. Verify the new version is running and test X logins
Caveat Upgrading display managers may require updating configuration syntax; ensure /etc/gdm/custom.conf, /etc/kdm/kdmrc, or /etc/wdm/wdm-config are compatible with newer versions before restarting.

Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.

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References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.

Primary sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2000-0491 in production — separate from our analysis above.

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What this is

A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.

What belongs here
  • Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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