CVE-2018-6017
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 · uneditedUnencrypted transmission of images in Tinder iOS app and Tinder Android app allows an attacker to extract private sensitive information by sniffing network traffic.
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 confidenceThe Tinder iOS and Android mobile applications transmit user profile images over unencrypted HTTP connections instead of protected HTTPS/TLS channels. An attacker positioned on the same network can perform traffic sniffing to intercept and extract private user images, leading to unauthorized disclosure of sensitive personal information.
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 dataall versionsCVSS 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
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- None
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N
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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Capture network traffic from the deviceUse a network packet capture tool (such as Wireshark, tcpdump, or a mobile proxy like Charles Proxy) to intercept all network traffic originating from the Tinder application on iOS or Android devices.Affected if Any HTTP traffic (port 80) containing image data or requests to image endpoints is observed in the capture.
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Identify image request endpointsIn the captured traffic, filter for HTTP requests where the URL path contains typical image file extensions (.jpg, .jpeg, .png) or image-related path segments (such as /images/, /photos/, /profile/, or similar).Affected if URLs appear with the 'http://' scheme rather than 'https://'.
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Verify protocol used for profile imagesExamine the HTTP headers and the full URL of each image request. Specifically look at the Host header and the request URL scheme to determine whether the connection uses HTTP or HTTPS.Affected if Image requests use URLs beginning with 'http://' (unencrypted) instead of 'https://' (encrypted).
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Confirm content is user profile dataCorrelate intercepted image URLs with user profiles visible in the Tinder application. Verify that the images being transmitted over HTTP correspond to actual user profile pictures within the app.Affected if User profile images from the Tinder app are being transmitted over unencrypted HTTP connections.
If the Tinder mobile application transmits any user profile images over HTTP rather than HTTPS, the environment is affected by this vulnerability.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
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 dataImplement TLS/SSL encryption (HTTPS) for all image transmission endpoints in both the iOS and Android applications, ensuring proper certificate validation to prevent man-in-the-middle attacks.
- Consultation6.0 h
- Implementation20.0 h
- Testing10.0 h
- Review / QA6.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $11,808.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2018-6017 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2018-6017 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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- 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
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