CVE-2020-35492 [High] | Memory Corruption in Cairo

A flaw was found in cairo's image-compositor.c in all versions prior to 1.17.4. This flaw allows an attacker who can provide a crafted input file to cairo's image-compositor (for example, by convincing a user to open a file in an application using cairo, or if an application uses cairo on untrusted input) to cause a stack buffer overflow -> out-of-bounds WRITE. The highest impact from this vulnerability is to confidentiality, integrity, as well as system availability.

#	Date	Old EPSS score	New EPSS score	Delta (New - Old)
1	2026-05-29	0.09%	0.27%	+0.18%
2	2025-11-21	0.18%	0.09%	-0.08%
3	2025-11-18	—	0.18%	—

Date

Old EPSS score

New EPSS score

Delta (New - Old)

2026-05-29

0.09%

0.27%

+0.18%

2025-11-21

0.18%

0.09%

-0.08%

2025-11-18

—

0.18%

—

Base score	Version	Severity	Vector	Exploitability	Impact	Score source
7.8	3.1	HIGH	`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/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:H) Serious risk that confidential data gets exposed in a big way. Integrity (I:H) They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt. Availability (A:H) Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.	1.8	5.9	[email protected]
6.8	2.0	MEDIUM	`AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:P/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:P) Partial confidentiality impact. Integrity impact (I:P) Partial integrity impact. Availability impact (A:P) Partial availability impact.	8.6	6.4	[email protected]

Base score

Version

Severity

Vector

Exploitability

Impact

Score source

7.8

3.1

HIGH

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/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:H): Serious risk that confidential data gets exposed in a big way.
Integrity (I:H): They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:H): Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.

1.8

5.9

[email protected]

6.8

2.0

MEDIUM

AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:P/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:P): Partial confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:P): Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:P): Partial availability impact.

8.6

6.4

[email protected]

OS Trackers for CVE-2020-35492

vendor	priority	summary	link
`alpine`	high	CVE-2020-35492: 1 source package rows (cairo); 17 state rows across 10 repos (3.10-main, 3.11-main, 3.12-main, 3.17-main, 3.18-main, 3.19-main, 3.20-main, 3.21-main, 3.22-main, edge-main); fixed 12, open 5.	https://security.alpinelinux.org/vuln/CVE-2020-35492
`debian`	not yet assigned	CVE-2020-35492 not yet assigned priority: Debian including 1 source packages (cairo), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5.	https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2020-35492
`gentoo`	normal	CVE-2020-35492: 1 GLSA(s) (202305-21), 1 atom(s) (x11-libs/cairo); latest impact normal.	https://bugs.gentoo.org/buglist.cgi?quicksearch=CVE-2020-35492
`redhat`	medium	—	https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-35492
`suse`	high	CVE-2020-35492 severity important: SUSE including 13 source package names (cairo, cairo-1.15.12-6.el8, …), 156 product×package rows across 36 product lines (HPE Helion OpenStack 8, SUSE Enterprise Storage 5, … (36 product lines)): Known Not Affected 150, Fixed 6.	https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-35492/
`ubuntu`	low	CVE-2020-35492 low priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (cairo), 16 status rows across 16 suites (bionic, focal, groovy, hirsute, impish, jammy, kinetic, lunar, mantic, noble, oracular, plucky, questing, trusty, upstream, xenial): not-affected 9, released 4, ignored 2, DNE 1.	https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2020-35492

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2020-35492

Vendor	Product	Version	Raw CPE
cairographics	cairo	< 1.17.4	cpe:2.3:a:cairographics:cairo::::::::

References for CVE-2020-35492

URL	Tags
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1898396	Issue Tracking Patch Third Party Advisory
https://security.gentoo.org/glsa/202305-21

URL

CVE-2020-35492

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2020-35492

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2020-35492

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2020-35492

OS Trackers for CVE-2020-35492

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2020-35492

References for CVE-2020-35492