Gnome
CVE-2020-16117
MEDIUM
Vulnerability Assessment
| Weakness |
CWE
OWASP Top 10:2025
A10:2025 - Mishandling of Exceptional Conditions
ASVS 5.0
V16 - Security Logging and Error Handling Null pointer safety, defensive checks
MITRE ATT&CK
1 technique across 1 tactic: Impact The technique list with ATT&CK links and the kill-chain view is part of the Basic plan and up. |
| Impact | CVSS score of 5.9 (MEDIUM). Attack characteristics: network attack vector, high complexity, no privileges required, no user interaction not required. Public proof-of-concept exploit code is available. |
| Exploit ScenarioDerived | A remote attacker could crash the application by dereferencing a null pointer by sending crafted requests to the affected application. No authentication is required to exploit this vulnerability. |
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Alert meAnalysisAI
In GNOME evolution-data-server before 3.35.91, a malicious server can crash the mail client with a NULL pointer dereference by sending an invalid (e.g., minimal) CAPABILITY line on a connection. Rated medium severity (CVSS 5.9), this vulnerability is remotely exploitable, no authentication required. Public exploit code available.
RemediationAI
A vendor patch is available. Apply the latest security update as soon as possible. Check pointers before dereferencing. Use static analysis tools to detect null pointer paths.
Affects your stack
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Checking this CVE against your own stacks and servers is part of the Basic plan and up.
Technical ContextAI · show details
This vulnerability is classified as NULL Pointer Dereference (CWE-476), which allows attackers to crash the application by dereferencing a null pointer. In GNOME evolution-data-server before 3.35.91, a malicious server can crash the mail client with a NULL pointer dereference by sending an invalid (e.g., minimal) CAPABILITY line on a connection attempt. This is related to imapx_free_capability and imapx_connect_to_server. Affected products include: Gnome Evolution-Data-Server, Debian Debian Linux. Version information: before 3.35.91.
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- Exploit and PoC references, threat intelligence from 22 sources
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Severity by source
AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Primary rating from NVD · only source for this CVE.
CVSS VectorNVD
DescriptionNVD
In GNOME evolution-data-server before 3.35.91, a malicious server can crash the mail client with a NULL pointer dereference by sending an invalid (e.g., minimal) CAPABILITY line on a connection attempt. This is related to imapx_free_capability and imapx_connect_to_server.
Threat Intelligence Overview
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
A null pointer dereference occurs when a program attempts to access memory through a pointer that has been set to NULL (address 0x0).
Denial of Service attacks render applications or systems unavailable by overwhelming resources or triggering failure conditions.
Affected Products (CPE)NVD
backend/comics/comics-document.c (aka the comic book backend) in GNOME Evince before 3.24.1 allows remote attackers to e
Network Manager VPNC plugin (aka networkmanager-vpnc) before version 1.2.6 is vulnerable to a privilege escalation attac
gio/gsocks4aproxy.c in GNOME GLib before 2.82.1 has an off-by-one error and resultant buffer overflow because SOCKS4_CON
Multiple integer overflows in the (1) vnc_connection_server_message and (2) vnc_color_map_set functions in gtk-vnc befor
GNOME OCRFeeder before 0.8.4 allows OS command injection via shell metacharacters in a PDF or image filename. Rated crit
libsoup from versions 2.65.1 until 2.68.1 have a heap-based buffer over-read because soup_ntlm_parse_challenge() in soup
Gnome Pango 1.42 and later is affected by: Buffer Overflow. Rated critical severity (CVSS 9.8), this vulnerability is re
In GNOME GLib 2.56.1, g_markup_parse_context_end_parse() in gmarkup.c has a NULL pointer dereference. Rated critical sev
Heap-based buffer overflow in GLib's g_escape_uri_string() function allows local attackers to achieve high-integrity and
An exploitable heap overflow vulnerability exists in the gdk_pixbuf__jpeg_image_load_increment functionality of Gdk-Pixb
Eye of GNOME (aka eog) 3.16.5, 3.17.x, 3.18.x before 3.18.3, 3.19.x, and 3.20.x before 3.20.4, when used with glib befor
An exploitable integer overflow vulnerability exists in the tiff_image_parse functionality of Gdk-Pixbuf 2.36.6 when com
NVD
CVE.org
EPSS
GitHub PoC
Exploit-DB