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Ubuntu LinuxOperating system · Canonical

CVE-2017-11683

MEDIUM · 6.5 CVSS v3.1 Published 2017-07-27
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
72/100
Remediation priority · Elevated
Remotely reachable No privileges

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
There is a reachable assertion in the Internal::TiffReader::visitDirectory function in tiffvisitor.cpp of Exiv2 0.26 that will lead to a remote denial of service attack via crafted input.

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 · high confidence

A reachable assertion in the Internal::TiffReader::visitDirectory function in tiffvisitor.cpp of Exiv2 0.26 can be triggered by a crafted TIFF file, causing the application to abort and resulting in a denial of service.

MitigationUpgrade Exiv2 to version 0.27 or later which contains the patched fix; avoid processing untrusted TIFF files until patched.

Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.

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
Ubuntu LinuxOperating system
Affected:= 14.04= 16.04= 18.04= 18.10
Debian LinuxOperating system
Affected:= 10.0
Exiv2Application
Affected:= 0.26

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
Privileges
None
User interaction
Required
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High

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

Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.

dbcve checks

Work through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.

  1. Verify Exiv2 is installed
    Run 'which exiv2' or 'dpkg -l | grep exiv2' (Debian/Ubuntu) or 'rpm -qa | grep exiv2' (RHEL/CentOS) to check if the Exiv2 package is present on the system
    Affected if Exiv2 is not installed on the system, then this CVE does not apply
  2. Retrieve installed Exiv2 version
    Run 'exiv2 --version' or 'exiv2 -V' to display the version number of the installed Exiv2 binary
    Affected if The displayed version is 0.26 (exact match)
  3. Verify package version on Linux systems
    For Debian/Ubuntu: run 'dpkg -s exiv2' and look for the Version field. For RHEL/CentOS: run 'rpm -qi exiv2' and check the Version field
    Affected if The package version shows 0.26 exactly

If Exiv2 version 0.26 is installed, the system is affected by this CVE and will abort when processing a crafted TIFF file due to the reachable assertion in TiffReader::visitDirectory.

Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.

Check your environment

Paste your version and any relevant configuration and it will be compared against the affected criteria above. Do not include secrets or credentials.

AI-assisted, checked against the advisory. Informational, not a guarantee.

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.

From vendor data
Mitigation available No clean upgrade yet — mitigate in the meantime
Mitigation

Upgrade Exiv2 to version 0.27 or later which contains the patched fix; avoid processing untrusted TIFF files until patched.

Fix this in Ubuntu Linux Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation4.0 h
  • Testing3.0 h
  • Review / QA2.0 h
11.0 hours of engineering $1,930
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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-2017-11683 in production — separate from our analysis above.

No notes yet

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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
  • No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
  • No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data