CVE-2020-21687

Exp

Buffer Overflow vulnerability in scan function in stdscan.c in nasm 2.15rc0 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service via crafted asm file.

Published: 2023-08-22 Last update: 2026-06-16 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]

Conclusion & alert: CVE-2020-21687 is rated Exploit Available (50/100): CVSS Medium severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.38%). Core evidence: 1 public exploit reference(s) are indexed (Exploit-DB). Mandatory action: 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-2020-21687

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

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2020-21687

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 0.48% 0.38% -0.10%
2 2025-11-21 0.08% 0.48% +0.40%
3 2025-11-18 0.08%

Full EPSS history (7 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2020-21687

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
5.5 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:L)
They already need access on the box, or another person has to do something wrong; it’s not a remote drive-by.
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.
1.8 3.6 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2020-21687

OS Trackers for CVE-2020-21687

vendor priority summary link
debian unimportant CVE-2020-21687 unimportant priority: Debian including 1 source packages (nasm), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2020-21687
redhat low https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-21687
suse low CVE-2020-21687 severity low: SUSE including 1 source package names (nasm), 17 product×package rows across 17 product lines (SUSE CaaS Platform 4.0, SUSE Enterprise Storage 7.1, … (17 product lines)): Will Not Fix 16, Known Not Affected 1. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-21687/
ubuntu medium CVE-2020-21687 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (nasm), 11 status rows across 11 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, lunar, mantic, noble, oracular, plucky, trusty, upstream, xenial): not-affected 6, ignored 4, released 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2020-21687

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2020-21687

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
nasm netwide_assembler 2.15 cpe:2.3:a:nasm:netwide_assembler:2.15:rc0:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2020-21687

URL Tags
https://bugzilla.nasm.us/show_bug.cgi?id=3392645 Exploit Issue Tracking Vendor Advisory
cvelogic Threat Intelligence