Gstreamer
CVE-2017-5837
MEDIUM
Vulnerability Assessment
| Weakness |
CWE
OWASP Top 10:2025
A10:2025 - Mishandling of Exceptional Conditions
ASVS 5.0
V16 - Security Logging and Error Handling Division safety checks
|
| Impact | This vulnerability presents moderate real-world risk despite its moderate CVSS score. The CVSS vector (CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H) indicates local attack vector with low complexity and user interaction required, affecting only availability. However, the EPSS score of 0.72% (72nd percentile) suggests non-trivial exploitation likelihood. The availability of a vendor patch and the abundance of security advisories (Debian DSA-3819, Red Hat RHSA-2017:2060, Gentoo GLSA-201705-10) indicate this was actively addressed across major distributions. No evidence of active exploitation (KEV status) or public POC is documented in the references, but the attack surface is significant since GStreamer processes untrusted media files in media players and applications. Organizations relying on GStreamer for media handling should prioritize patching, though the local attack vector and user-interaction requirement lower urgency compared to remote code execution vulnerabilities. |
| Exploit ScenarioDerived | An attacker crafts a malicious AVI or WAV file with an invalid audio header (e.g., zero block alignment or malformed channel count) and distributes it via email or a compromised website. A user opens the file in a media player (such as VLC, Totem, or Rhythmbox) that uses GStreamer for decoding. GStreamer's audio capability negotiation code encounters a division-by-zero condition in gst_riff_create_audio_caps and crashes, causing the media player to exit abruptly. While this results in denial-of-service rather than code execution, it can disrupt workflows or be chained with other vulnerabilities in certain contexts. |
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Alert meAnalysisAIv1 – Mar 17, 2026
A floating-point exception vulnerability exists in the gst_riff_create_audio_caps function within GStreamer's gst-plugins-base library, allowing remote attackers to trigger a denial-of-service condition by crafting malicious video files. GStreamer versions before 1.10.3 are affected. The vulnerability has a moderate CVSS score of 5.5 but an EPSS percentile of 72%, indicating meaningful exploitation probability; a vendor patch is available.
RemediationAI
Upgrade GStreamer and gst-plugins-base to version 1.10.3 or later immediately. Users of Debian should apply security update DSA-3819 (or the Debian LTS update from 2020-02); Red Hat users should apply RHSA-2017:2060; Gentoo users should apply GLSA-201705-10. For applications that cannot be immediately patched, restrict processing of untrusted media files or run GStreamer pipelines in sandboxed/containerized environments with resource limits to minimize crash impact. Validate that media file headers conform to RIFF specifications before passing to GStreamer, though this is not a substitute for patching.
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Technical ContextAI · show details
The vulnerability resides in gst-libs/gst/riff/riff-media.c, part of the GStreamer multimedia framework (CPE: cpe:2.3:a:gstreamer:gstreamer). GStreamer is a widely-deployed open-source media pipeline library used across Linux distributions and embedded systems for audio/video processing. The root cause is classified as CWE-369 (Divide By Zero), which occurs when the audio format parsing logic fails to validate numeric parameters before performing division operations. An attacker supplies a crafted RIFF audio header with malformed channel count, sample rate, or block alignment values that cause an unhandled division-by-zero exception during audio capability negotiation, crashing the GStreamer pipeline.
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Severity by source
AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Primary rating from NVD · only source for this CVE.
CVSS VectorNVD
Lifecycle Timeline
2DescriptionCVE.org
The gst_riff_create_audio_caps function in gst-libs/gst/riff/riff-media.c in gst-plugins-base in GStreamer before 1.10.3 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (floating point exception and crash) via a crafted video file.
Executive ViewAI
Organizations using gst-libs/gst/riff/riff-media.c in gst-plugins-base in GStreamer should be aware of moderate risk from CVE-2017-5837 rated CVSS 5.5. Exploitation could compromise the security of affected deployments. A patch is available and should be applied during regular vulnerability management.
Apply vendor patch. If patching is delayed: restrict network access and enable monitoring.
Threat Intelligence Overview
NVD
CVE.org
EPSS
VulDB
How this decision was reached
The engine reads each signal below and applies a fixed list of rules from top to bottom. The first rule that matches sets the recommended action – like a statement, every line is shown.
What every action level means
SSVC AssessmentENISA
Priority Score
Attack Technique
Denial of Service attacks render applications or systems unavailable by overwhelming resources or triggering failure conditions.
Affected Products (CPE)CVE.org
Heap-based buffer overflow in the flx_decode_delta_fli function in gst/flx/gstflxdec.c in the FLIC decoder in GStreamer
Heap-based buffer overflow in the flx_decode_delta_fli function in gst/flx/gstflxdec.c in the FLIC decoder in GStreamer
Heap-based buffer overflow in the flx_decode_delta_fli function in gst/flx/gstflxdec.c in the FLIC decoder in GStreamer
The FLIC decoder in GStreamer before 1.10.2 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (out-of-bounds write an
A heap-based buffer overflow vulnerability exists in GStreamer's RTSP connection parser that allows remote attackers to
A heap buffer over-read vulnerability exists in GStreamer's isomp4 plugin that allows reading past allocated memory boun
An integer overflow vulnerability in the GStreamer multimedia framework's matroska demuxer allows heap memory corruption
A critical integer overflow vulnerability in GStreamer's qtdemux element allows attackers to trigger denial of service o
A critical integer overflow vulnerability in the GStreamer multimedia framework's Matroska (MKV) demuxer can cause denia
An integer overflow vulnerability in GStreamer's Matroska demuxer can cause denial of service or potentially heap memory
An integer overflow vulnerability in GStreamer's AVI demux element allows attackers to trigger a heap overwrite when par
A heap overflow vulnerability exists in GStreamer's matroskaparse element due to an integer overflow in the gst_matroska
GitHub PoC
Exploit-DB