CVE-2017-3898

Exp

A man-in-the-middle attack vulnerability in the non-certificate-based authentication mechanism in McAfee LiveSafe (MLS) versions prior to 16.0.3 allows network attackers to modify the Windows registry value associated with the McAfee update via the HTTP backend-response.

Published: 2017-09-01 Last update: 2026-05-13 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2017-3898 is rated High Exploit Risk (73.6/100): CVSS Medium severity, with high exploitation likelihood (EPSS 7.22%, 91th percentile). 1 public exploit reference(s) are indexed (Exploit-DB). EPSS rose +3.05% over the last day, indicating growing attacker interest. Public exploits are available—assess exposure, apply mitigations, and prioritize patching.

Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.

Public exploit references (Exploit-DB) for CVE-2017-3898

EDB-ID Source Kind Published Link
44062 exploit_db edb 2017-09-07 Exploit-DB ↗

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2017-3898

EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).

# Date Old EPSS score New EPSS score Delta (New - Old)
1 2026-02-19 4.17% 7.22% +3.05%
2 2025-03-30 4.11% 4.17% +0.06%
3 2025-03-29 — 4.11% —

Full EPSS history (7 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2017-3898

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
5.9 3.0 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:H)
Even with access, the exploit needs extra luck, timing, or a fussy environment to actually work.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:N)
Doesn’t really leak secrets in a meaningful way.
Integrity (I:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.
 2.2 3.6 [email protected]
4.3 2.0 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:N Click to expand
Access vector (AV:N)
Can be exploited remotely over network reachability.
Access complexity (AC:M)
Exploitation needs some favorable conditions, but not exceptional ones.
Authentication (AU:N)
No authentication is required.
Confidentiality impact (C:N)
No confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:P)
Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:N)
No availability impact.
 8.6 2.9 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2017-3898

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2017-3898

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
mcafee livesafe <= 16.0.2 cpe:2.3:a:mcafee:livesafe:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2017-3898

cvelogic Threat Intelligence