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Ubuntu LinuxOperating system · Canonical

CVE-2017-17884

MEDIUM · 6.5 CVSS v3.0 Published 2017-12-27
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
In ImageMagick 7.0.7-16 Q16, a memory leak vulnerability was found in the function WriteOnePNGImage in coders/png.c, which allows attackers to cause a denial of service via a crafted PNG image file.

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 memory leak vulnerability exists in ImageMagick 7.0.7-16 Q16 in the WriteOnePNGImage function within coders/png.c. When processing a specially crafted PNG image file, the function fails to properly deallocate memory, leading to memory exhaustion and denial of service.

MitigationUpgrade ImageMagick to a version beyond 7.0.7-16 where the memory leak is patched. Additionally, implement validation and sandboxing for uploaded PNG files and consider resource limits on image processing to mitigate exploitation.

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= 17.10= 18.04
ImagemagickApplication
Affected:= 7.0.7-16

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:3.0/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. Identify installed ImageMagick version
    Run 'identify -version' or 'convert -version' to display the version number
    Affected if Version is exactly 7.0.7-16 (other versions are not affected by this specific CVE)
  2. Confirm PNG support is available
    Run 'identify -list configure | grep DELEGATES' or check if 'png' appears in the delegates list
    Affected if PNG support is enabled and the png.c coder module is loaded
  3. Determine if ImageMagick processes untrusted PNG input
    Review system configuration for services that use ImageMagick to process user-submitted files, such as web servers, content management systems, or file upload handlers
    Affected if ImageMagick is configured to process PNG files from untrusted or anonymous sources
  4. Check for resource limits on ImageMagick execution
    Inspect system resource limits (ulimit), systemd service limits, or application-level restrictions that control memory usage for ImageMagick processes
    Affected if No memory or execution time limits are configured, allowing unbounded memory allocation

You are affected if ImageMagick version 7.0.7-16 is installed with PNG support enabled and the system processes untrusted PNG files without resource constraints.

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 ImageMagick to a version beyond 7.0.7-16 where the memory leak is patched. Additionally, implement validation and sandboxing for uploaded PNG files and consider resource limits on image processing to mitigate exploitation.

Fix this in Ubuntu Linux Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation3.0 h
  • Testing2.0 h
  • Review / QA1.0 h
8.0 hours of engineering $1,420
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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-2017-17884 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