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CVE-2019-18397: GNU FriBidi Denial of Service or Code Execution in GNOME and GTK+ Apps

CVE-2019-18397 · published 6 years ago

Summary

A bug in the GNU FriBidi library can cause a denial of service or allow an attacker to run malicious code on a computer when a specially crafted text file is opened in a GNOME or GTK+ application, such as GEdit or HexChat.

What to do

The CVE record does not list a fixed version. Check the vendor's site or the advisory links below - a fix may already be released.

Affected software

Vendor	Product	Affected versions
gnu	fribidi	>= 1.0.0, <= 1.0.7 `cpe:2.3:a:gnu:fribidi::::::::`
debian	debian_linux	10.0 8.0 9.0 `cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:10.0:::::::*`

Original advisory text

A buffer overflow in the fribidi_get_par_embedding_levels_ex() function in lib/fribidi-bidi.c of GNU FriBidi through 1.0.7 allows an attacker to cause a denial of service or possibly execute arbitrary code by delivering crafted text content to a user, when this content is then rendered by an application that uses FriBidi for text layout calculations. Examples include any GNOME or GTK+ based application that uses Pango for text layout, as this internally uses FriBidi for bidirectional text layout. For example, the attacker can construct a crafted text file to be opened in GEdit, or a crafted IRC message to be viewed in HexChat.

References

Fix within

Internet-facing 14 days

Internal At next upgrade

Not known to be exploited
Needs hands-on effort to exploit (estimated)
Gives an attacker full control (estimated)

Severity

7.8 High

Exploitation

2% chance of attack within 30 days

Type

CWE-120Classic Buffer Overflow

Timeline

Published13 Nov 2019

Updated4 Nov 2026

First seen15 Mar 2026

Sources

CVE-2019-18397 · OSV

CVE-2019-18397 · NVD

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