CVE-2023-1981

Exp

A vulnerability was found in the avahi library. This flaw allows an unprivileged user to make a dbus call, causing the avahi daemon to crash.

Published: 2023-05-26 Last update: 2026-06-17 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]

Conclusion & alert: CVE-2023-1981 is rated Exploit Available (50/100): CVSS Medium severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.39%). 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-2023-1981

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

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2023-1981

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 0.02% 0.39% +0.38%
2 2025-11-21 0.07% 0.02% -0.06%
3 2025-11-18 0.07%

Full EPSS history (6 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2023-1981

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:L/UI:N/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:L)
A normal user session is enough; they don’t have to be admin.
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: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]
5.5 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/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:L)
A normal user session is enough; they don’t have to be admin.
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: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 134c704f-9b21-4f2e-91b3-4a467353bcc0

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2023-1981

OS Trackers for CVE-2023-1981

vendor priority summary link
alpine CVE-2023-1981: 1 source package rows (avahi); 5 state rows across 5 repos (3.19-main, 3.20-main, 3.21-main, 3.22-main, edge-main); fixed 5, open 0. https://security.alpinelinux.org/vuln/CVE-2023-1981
debian not yet assigned CVE-2023-1981 not yet assigned priority: Debian including 1 source packages (avahi), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2023-1981
redhat medium https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2023-1981
suse medium CVE-2023-1981 severity moderate: SUSE including 450 source package names (2.0.2-4.2.20:avahi-0.8-150400.7.3.1, 2.0.2-4.2.20:libavahi-common3-0.8-150400.7.3.1, …), 910 product×package rows across 193 product lines (Container suse/pcp, Container suse/sle-micro-rancher/5.2, … (193 product lines)): Fixed 763, Known Affected 147. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2023-1981/
ubuntu medium CVE-2023-1981 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (avahi), 8 status rows across 8 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, kinetic, lunar, trusty, upstream, xenial): released 7, pending 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2023-1981

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2023-1981

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
avahi avahi 0.7-20 cpe:2.3:a:avahi:avahi:0.7-20:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 37 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:37:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
redhat enterprise_linux 6.0 cpe:2.3:o:redhat:enterprise_linux:6.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
redhat enterprise_linux 7.0 cpe:2.3:o:redhat:enterprise_linux:7.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
redhat enterprise_linux 8.0 cpe:2.3:o:redhat:enterprise_linux:8.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
redhat enterprise_linux 9.0 cpe:2.3:o:redhat:enterprise_linux:9.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2023-1981

cvelogic Threat Intelligence