CVE-2018-16509
An issue was discovered in Artifex Ghostscript before 9.24. Incorrect "restoration of privilege" checking during handling of…
- 7.8HighCVSS base score
- 92.3%Exploitation in 30 daysEPSS · top 0.2% of all CVEs
- NoKnown exploitednot in CISA's KEV catalog
- 2Public exploitsMetasploit, Nuclei and Exploit-DB
Description
An issue was discovered in Artifex Ghostscript before 9.24. Incorrect "restoration of privilege" checking during handling of /invalidaccess exceptions could be used by attackers able to supply crafted PostScript to execute code using the "pipe" instruction.
Public exploit
An exploit or proof of concept is public: anyone can try it against an unpatched system. The public collections list a Metasploit module and an Exploit-DB entry for it. A reference of the record is tagged as an exploit.
Show the exploits3
Metasploit modules1 module
- Ghostscript Failed Restore Command Execution (Metasploit module) (opens in a new tab)
exploit/multi/fileformat/ghostscript_failed_restoreRank excellentdisclosed 21 Aug 2018
Exploit-DB1 entry
- Ghostscript - Failed Restore Command Execution (Metasploit) (Exploit-DB entry) (opens in a new tab)
EDB-ID 45369local, linuxpublished 10 Sept 2018Verified
References tagged exploit1 reference
- 45369 (opens in a new tab)exploitx_refsource_EXPLOIT-DBx_transferred
Modules, templates and exploits as listed by the Metasploit Framework (BSD-3-Clause), ProjectDiscovery's Nuclei templates (MIT) and the Exploit Database (GPLv2), read once a day. Where the data comes from
Timeline
ID reserved
By mitre
- 1 day later
· 1 day later
Published
- 6 years later
· 6 years later
Record updated
Changes after publication (a new score, a public exploit, EPSS crossing 1, 10 or 50 %, leaving KEV) are kept since November 2026; earlier ones are not known.
Scores
| Scored by | CVSS | Score | Vector |
|---|---|---|---|
| NVDNVD · Modified | 3.0 | High7.8 | CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H |
- EPSS (exploitation in 30 days)
- 92.3% · top 0.2% of all CVEs (11 Nov 2026)
The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: High 7.8.
Affected products
n/a
- affected n/a
References
References15
- http://git.ghostscript.com/?p=ghostpdl.git%3Ba=commit%3Bh=5516c614dc33662a2afdc377159f70218e67bde5 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
- 45369 (opens in a new tab)exploitx_refsource_EXPLOIT-DBx_transferred
- https://bugs.ghostscript.com/show_bug.cgi?id=699654 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
- RHSA-2018:2918 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_REDHATx_transferred
- http://git.ghostscript.com/?p=ghostpdl.git%3Ba=commit%3Bh=79cccf641486a6595c43f1de1cd7ade696020a31 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
- GLSA-201811-12 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_GENTOOx_transferred
- USN-3768-1 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_UBUNTUx_transferred
- https://www.artifex.com/news/ghostscript-security-resolved/ (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
- RHSA-2018:3760 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_REDHATx_transferred
- http://seclists.org/oss-sec/2018/q3/142 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
- DSA-4294 (opens in a new tab)vendor-advisoryx_refsource_DEBIANx_transferred
- [debian-lts-announce] 20180913 [SECURITY] [DLA 1504-1] ghostscript security update (opens in a new tab)mailing-listx_refsource_MLISTx_transferred
- 105122 (opens in a new tab)vdb-entryx_refsource_BIDx_transferred
- http://git.ghostscript.com/?p=ghostpdl.git%3Ba=commit%3Bh=78911a01b67d590b4a91afac2e8417360b934156 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred
- http://git.ghostscript.com/?p=ghostpdl.git%3Ba=commitdiff%3Bh=520bb0ea7519aa3e79db78aaf0589dae02103764 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_CONFIRMx_transferred
Sources
The same CVE in the primary databases and aggregators, to check against.
- CVE.org record (opens in a new tab)
- CVE List JSON (GitHub) (opens in a new tab)
- NVD (opens in a new tab)
- FIRST EPSS (opens in a new tab)
- EUVD EUVD-2018-8320 (opens in a new tab)
- OSV.dev (opens in a new tab)
- GitHub Advisories (opens in a new tab)
- CIRCL Vulnerability-Lookup (opens in a new tab)
Badge for a README or a ticket
[](https://cveledger.app/cve/CVE-2018-16509)Record last updated .