CVE-2016-5384

Severity: high (CVSS 7.8 v3.1)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.4% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2016-08-13 · updated 2026-06-17
Weakness: CWE-415

Description

fontconfig before 2.12.1 does not validate offsets, which allows local users to trigger arbitrary free calls and consequently conduct double free attacks and execute arbitrary code via a crafted cache file.

Affected products

Canonical Ubuntu Linux: 12.04, 14.04, 16.04
Debian Linux: 8.0
Fedoraproject Fedora: 23, 24
fontconfig project fontconfig: before 2.12.1 — fixed in 2.12.1

How to fix

Upgrade to a fixed version: fontconfig project fontconfig 2.12.1. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.

References

http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2016-2601.html
http://www.debian.org/security/2016/dsa-3644
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/92339
http://www.ubuntu.com/usn/USN-3063-1
https://cgit.freedesktop.org/fontconfig/commit/?id=7a4a5bd7897d216f0794ca9dbce0a4a5c9d14940
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/6CJ45VRAMCIISHOVKFVOQYQUSTUJP7FC/
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/GGOS4YYB7UYAWX5AEXJZHDIX4ZMSXSW5/
https://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/fontconfig/2016-August/005792.html
http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2016-2601.html
http://www.debian.org/security/2016/dsa-3644
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/92339
http://www.ubuntu.com/usn/USN-3063-1

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