CVE Vulnerabilities

CVE-2021-25786

Use After Free

Published: Aug 11, 2023 | Modified: Sep 27, 2023
CVSS 3.x
5.3
MEDIUM
Source:
NVD
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L
CVSS 2.x
RedHat/V2
RedHat/V3
5.3 MODERATE
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L
Ubuntu
MEDIUM

An issue was discovered in QPDF version 10.0.4, allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via crafted .pdf file to Pl_ASCII85Decoder::write parameter in libqpdf.

Weakness

Referencing memory after it has been freed can cause a program to crash, use unexpected values, or execute code.

Affected Software

Name Vendor Start Version End Version
Qpdf Qpdf_project 10.0.4 (including) 10.0.4 (including)
Qpdf Ubuntu bionic *
Qpdf Ubuntu esm-infra/xenial *
Qpdf Ubuntu focal *
Qpdf Ubuntu trusty *
Qpdf Ubuntu upstream *
Qpdf Ubuntu xenial *

Extended Description

The use of previously-freed memory can have any number of adverse consequences, ranging from the corruption of valid data to the execution of arbitrary code, depending on the instantiation and timing of the flaw. The simplest way data corruption may occur involves the system’s reuse of the freed memory. Use-after-free errors have two common and sometimes overlapping causes:

In this scenario, the memory in question is allocated to another pointer validly at some point after it has been freed. The original pointer to the freed memory is used again and points to somewhere within the new allocation. As the data is changed, it corrupts the validly used memory; this induces undefined behavior in the process. If the newly allocated data happens to hold a class, in C++ for example, various function pointers may be scattered within the heap data. If one of these function pointers is overwritten with an address to valid shellcode, execution of arbitrary code can be achieved.

Potential Mitigations

References