CVE-2018-20551

Exp

A reachable Object::getString assertion in Poppler 0.72.0 allows attackers to cause a denial of service due to construction of invalid rich media annotation assets in the AnnotRichMedia class in Annot.c.

Published: 2018-12-28 Last update: 2026-06-16 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2018-20551 is rated High Exploit Risk (69.8/100): CVSS Medium severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 1.95%). 1 public exploit reference(s) are indexed (Exploit-DB). EPSS rose +1.63% 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-2018-20551

EDB-ID Source Kind Published Link
— nvd_ref exploit_tag Exploit-DB ↗

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2018-20551

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 2026-06-15 0.32% 1.95% +1.63%
2 2025-11-18 0.53% 0.32% -0.21%
3 2025-03-30 — 0.53% —

Full EPSS history (10 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2018-20551

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
6.5 3.0 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H 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:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:R)
A real person has to do something—click, install, enable—otherwise it doesn’t land.
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:N)
Data isn’t meaningfully altered or forged.
Availability (A:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 2.8 3.6 [email protected]
4.3 2.0 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P 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:N)
No integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:P)
Partial availability impact.
 8.6 2.9 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2018-20551

OS Trackers for CVE-2018-20551

vendor priority summary link
debian low CVE-2018-20551 low priority: Debian including 1 source packages (poppler), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2018-20551
redhat low — https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2018-20551
suse low CVE-2018-20551 severity low: SUSE including 33 source package names (libpoppler-cpp0, libpoppler-cpp0-0.62.0-4.6.1, …), 203 product×package rows across 44 product lines (SLES for SAP Applications 11 SP3, SUSE CaaS Platform 4.0, … (44 product lines)): Fixed 118, Known Not Affected 85. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2018-20551/
ubuntu low CVE-2018-20551 low priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (poppler), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bionic, cosmic, trusty, upstream, xenial): released 3, DNE 1, needs-triage 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2018-20551

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2018-20551

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
freedesktop poppler 0.72.0 cpe:2.3:a:freedesktop:poppler:0.72.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 14.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:14.04:*:*:*:lts:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 16.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:16.04:*:*:*:lts:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 18.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:18.04:*:*:*:lts:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 18.10 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:18.10:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2018-20551

cvelogic Threat Intelligence