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Debian LinuxOperating system · Debian

CVE-2025-3887

HIGH · 8.8 CVSS v3.0 Published 2025-05-22
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to 1.26.1 or later.
See remediation →
95/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
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
GStreamer H265 Codec Parsing Stack-based Buffer Overflow Remote Code Execution Vulnerability. This vulnerability allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code on affected installations of GStreamer. Interaction with this library is required to exploit this vulnerability but attack vectors may vary depending on the implementation. The specific flaw exists within the parsing of H265 slice headers. The issue results from the lack of proper validation of the length of user-supplied data prior to copying it to a fixed-length stack-based buffer. An attacker can leverage this vulnerability to execute code in the context of the current process. Was ZDI-CAN-26596.

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

GStreamer contains a stack-based buffer overflow vulnerability in its H.265 codec parser when handling slice headers. The parser fails to validate the length of user-supplied data before copying it into a fixed-size stack buffer, allowing an attacker to overwrite stack memory and achieve arbitrary code execution by crafting malicious H.265 streams.

MitigationApply vendor patches for GStreamer when available. Until then, restrict processing of untrusted H.265 media files and validate input streams through sandboxing or content disarm to limit exposure.

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
Debian LinuxOperating system
Affected:= 11.0
GstreamerApplication
Affected:>= 1.0.0, < 1.26.1

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
High
Integrity
High
Availability
High

CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/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. Check if GStreamer is installed
    Run 'dpkg -l | grep gstreamer' on Debian or 'rpm -qa | grep gstreamer' on RHEL-based systems to list installed GStreamer packages
    Affected if No GStreamer packages found means not affected
  2. Determine installed GStreamer version
    Run 'gst-inspect-1.0 --version' or check the libgstreamer-1.0.so.0 library version using 'ldconfig -p | grep libgstreamer-1.0'
    Affected if Version is 1.0.0 or higher but lower than 1.26.1 indicates the vulnerable version range
  3. Verify H.265 parser element availability
    Run 'gst-inspect-1.0 h265parse' to confirm the H.265 parsing element is available on the system
    Affected if If the h265parse element loads successfully, the vulnerable code path exists on the system
  4. Check for active H.265 media processing
    Review any running applications or services that use GStreamer to process video, or examine pipeline configurations for H.265 decoding elements such as h265dec or files with .hevc/.h265 extensions
    Affected if Systems actively parsing or decoding untrusted H.265 streams through GStreamer are at risk

A system is affected if it runs any GStreamer version from 1.0.0 through 1.26.0 and processes untrusted H.265 media files or streams using the H.265 parser.

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.

dbcve · scoped
Upgrade available Upgrade to 1.26.1 or later
Fixed in 1.26.1
Interim mitigation

Apply vendor patches for GStreamer when available. Until then, restrict processing of untrusted H.265 media files and validate input streams through sandboxing or content disarm to limit exposure.

Recommended fix High confidence

GStreamer 1.26.1 or later

  1. Identify the GStreamer packages installed on the system using package manager (e.g., dpkg -l | grep gstreamer for Debian)
  2. For Debian 11 (Bullseye): Run 'apt-get update' followed by 'apt-get upgrade' to receive the latest GStreamer packages from Debian repositories
  3. Alternatively, for specific GStreamer version upgrade: Use the system's package manager to upgrade gstreamer1.0-plugins-base and related packages
  4. Verify the installed GStreamer version after upgrade using 'gst-inspect-1.0 --version' or checking the package version
  5. Test that media processing functionality remains operational after the upgrade

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

Fix this in Debian Linux Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation4.0 h
  • Implementation8.0 h
  • Testing8.0 h
  • Review / QA4.0 h
24.0 hours of engineering $4,160
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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-2025-3887 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
  • No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
  • No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data