Libpcap
CVE-2024-8006
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 4.4 (MEDIUM). Attack characteristics: local attack vector, low complexity, high privileges required, no user interaction not required. |
| Exploit ScenarioDerived | A local attacker with access to the system could crash the application by dereferencing a null pointer. |
Get an e-mail when this CVE is exploited, patched or re-scored. Free account.
Alert meAnalysisAI
Remote packet capture support is disabled by default in libpcap. Rated medium severity (CVSS 4.4), this vulnerability is low attack complexity. This NULL Pointer Dereference vulnerability could allow attackers to crash the application by dereferencing a null pointer.
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
Find out whether the stacks and servers you run are on an affected version.
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. Remote packet capture support is disabled by default in libpcap. When a user builds libpcap with remote packet capture support enabled, one of the functions that become available is pcap_findalldevs_ex(). One of the function arguments can be a filesystem path, which normally means a directory with input data files. When the specified path cannot be used as a directory, the function receives NULL from opendir(), but does not check the return value and passes the NULL value to readdir(), which causes a NULL pointer derefence. Affected products include: Tcpdump Libpcap.
Know when Libpcap gets its next vulnerability
- Watch products and get an email when something new is published
- Check this CVE against your own stack and servers
- Exploit and PoC references, threat intelligence from 22 sources
No credit card · 7-day full trial
Severity by source
AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Primary rating from NVD · only source for this CVE.
CVSS VectorNVD
DescriptionNVD
Remote packet capture support is disabled by default in libpcap. When a user builds libpcap with remote packet capture support enabled, one of the functions that become available is pcap_findalldevs_ex(). One of the function arguments can be a filesystem path, which normally means a directory with input data files. When the specified path cannot be used as a directory, the function receives NULL from opendir(), but does not check the return value and passes the NULL value to readdir(), which causes a NULL pointer derefence.
Threat Intelligence Overview
NVD
CVE.org
EPSS
GitHub
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
Unvalidated BPF scratch-register array index in libpcap's user-space BPF interpreter allows a local attacker with low pr
Denial of service in libpcap before 1.10.7 allows an unauthenticated remote attacker to hang the offline BPF filter inte
rpcapd/daemon.c in libpcap before 1.9.1 allows attackers to cause a denial of service (NULL pointer dereference and daem
Division by zero in libpcap's BPF interpreter can crash any application using the library when processing a crafted filt
Process termination via crafted BPF filter in libpcap allows a local attacker with low privileges to crash any applicati
Out-of-bounds memory reads in libpcap's userland BPF interpreter allow a local attacker who can supply a crafted filter
sf-pcapng.c in libpcap before 1.9.1 does not properly validate the PHB header length before allocating memory. Rated med
rpcapd/daemon.c in libpcap before 1.9.1 allows SSRF because a URL may be provided as a capture source. Rated medium seve
rpcapd/daemon.c in libpcap before 1.9.1 on non-Windows platforms provides details about why authentication failed, which
rpcapd/daemon.c in libpcap before 1.9.1 mishandles certain length values because of reuse of a variable. Rated medium se
Remote memory disclosure in libpcap's rpcap client allows a malicious or compromised rpcap server to cause a connected c
Memory exhaustion in libpcap's rpcapd remote capture daemon allows an authenticated remote client to degrade or crash th
Exploit-DB