CVE-2018-16395
9.8
CRITICAL · CVSS 3.0 · EPSS 10.7% (pctl 96)
Patch early
EPSS 10.7% — above the 10% action threshold.
Description
An issue was discovered in the OpenSSL library in Ruby before 2.3.8, 2.4.x before 2.4.5, 2.5.x before 2.5.2, and 2.6.x before 2.6.0-preview3. When two OpenSSL::X509::Name objects are compared using ==, depending on the ordering, non-equal objects may return true. When the first argument is one character longer than the second, or the second argument contains a character that is one less than a character in the same position of the first argument, the result of == will be true. This could be leveraged to create an illegitimate certificate that may be accepted as legitimate and then used in signing or encryption operations.
Scoring
| CVSS | 9.8 (CRITICAL, v3.0) |
|---|---|
| Vector | CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H |
| EPSS | 10.72% — more likely to be exploited than 96% of all CVEs |
| On CISA KEV | no |
| Public exploit | none known |
| Published | 2018-11-16 |
| Last modified | 2026-06-17 |
Affected (5)
| Vendor | Product |
|---|---|
| canonical | ubuntu linux |
| debian | debian linux |
| redhat | enterprise linux |
| ruby-lang | openssl |
| ruby-lang | ruby |
References
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2019-07/msg00036.html
- http://www.securitytracker.com/id/1042105
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2018:3729
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2018:3730
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2018:3731
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2018:3738
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2019:1948
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2019:2565
- https://hackerone.com/reports/387250
- https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2018/10/msg00020.html
- https://security.netapp.com/advisory/ntap-20190221-0002/
- https://usn.ubuntu.com/3808-1/
- https://www.debian.org/security/2018/dsa-4332
- https://www.oracle.com/security-alerts/cpujan2020.html
- https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/news/2018/10/17/openssl-x509-name-equality-check-does-not-work-correctly-cve-2018-16395/
- https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/news/2018/10/17/ruby-2-3-8-released/
- https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/news/2018/10/17/ruby-2-4-5-released/
- https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/news/2018/10/17/ruby-2-5-2-released/
- https://www.ruby-lang.org/en/news/2018/11/06/ruby-2-6-0-preview3-released/
- http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2019-07/msg00036.html
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