An out-of-bounds read flaw was found in w3m, in the growbuf_to_Str function in indep.c. This issue may allow an attacker to cause a denial of service through a crafted HTML file.

The Linux/Unix host has one or more packages installed that are impacted by a vulnerability without a vendor supplied patch available.

  - An out-of-bounds read flaw was found in w3m, in the growbuf_to_Str function in indep.c. This issue may     allow an attacker to cause a denial of service through a crafted HTML file. (CVE-2023-38253)

Note that Nessus relies on the presence of the package as reported by the vendor.

The version of Tencent Linux installed on the remote TencentOS Server 4 host is prior to tested version. It is, therefore, affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the TSSA-2025:0165 advisory.

    Package updates are available for TencentOS Server 4 that fix the following vulnerabilities:

    CVE-2023-4255:
    An out-of-bounds write issue has been discovered in the backspace handling of the checkType() function in     etc.c within the W3M application. This vulnerability is triggered by supplying a specially crafted HTML     file to the w3m binary. Exploitation of this flaw could lead to application crashes, resulting in a denial     of service condition.

    CVE-2023-38253:
    An out-of-bounds read flaw was found in w3m, in the growbuf_to_Str function in indep.c. This issue may     allow an attacker to cause a denial of service through a crafted HTML file.

    CVE-2023-38252:
    An out-of-bounds read flaw was found in w3m, in the Strnew_size function in Str.c. This issue may allow an     attacker to cause a denial of service through a crafted HTML file.

    CVE-2022-38223:
    There is an out-of-bounds write in checkType located in etc.c in w3m 0.5.3. It can be triggered by sending     a crafted HTML file to the w3m binary. It allows an attacker to cause Denial of Service or possibly have     unspecified other impact.

Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Tencent Linux security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

There are packages installed that are affected by multiple vulnerabilities referenced in the following CVEs:

  - w3m through 0.5.3 does not properly handle temporary files when the ~/.w3m directory is unwritable, which
    allows a local attacker to craft a symlink attack to overwrite arbitrary files. (CVE-2018-6198)

  - w3m through 0.5.3 is prone to an infinite recursion flaw in HTMLlineproc0 because the feed_table_block_tag
    function in table.c does not prevent a negative indent value. (CVE-2018-6196)

  - w3m through 0.5.3 is prone to a NULL pointer dereference flaw in formUpdateBuffer in form.c.
    (CVE-2018-6197)

  - There is an out-of-bounds write in checkType located in etc.c in w3m 0.5.3. It can be triggered by sending
    a crafted HTML file to the w3m binary. It allows an attacker to cause Denial of Service or possibly have
    unspecified other impact. (CVE-2022-38223)

There are packages installed that are affected by multiple vulnerabilities referenced in the following CVEs:

  - An out-of-bounds read flaw was found in w3m, in the Strnew_size function in Str.c. This issue may allow an
    attacker to cause a denial of service through a crafted HTML file. (CVE-2023-38252)

  - An out-of-bounds read flaw was found in w3m, in the growbuf_to_Str function in indep.c. This issue may
    allow an attacker to cause a denial of service through a crafted HTML file. (CVE-2023-38253)

The remote Fedora 40 host has a package installed that is affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the FEDORA-2024-aeb75f8b5b advisory.

    - Added upstream patch to fix out-of-bounds access due to multiple backspaces to address incomplete fix     for CVE-2022-38223 (#2222775, #2222780, #2255207)


Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Fedora security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

The remote Fedora 39 host has a package installed that is affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the FEDORA-2024-3fc66f8bf3 advisory.

    - Added upstream patch to fix out-of-bounds access due to multiple backspaces to address incomplete fix     for CVE-2022-38223 (#2222775, #2222780, #2255207)


Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Fedora security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

The remote Fedora 38 host has a package installed that is affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the FEDORA-2024-38c2261ca0 advisory.

    - Added upstream patch to fix out-of-bounds access due to multiple backspaces to address incomplete fix     for CVE-2022-38223 (#2222775, #2222780, #2255207)


Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Fedora security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

The remote SUSE Linux SLED15 / SLED_SAP15 / SLES15 / SLES_SAP15 / openSUSE 15 host has packages installed that are affected by multiple vulnerabilities as referenced in the SUSE-SU-2023:4439-1 advisory.

    - Update to version 0.5.3+git20230121
    - CVE-2023-38252: Fixed an out-of-bounds write in function Strnew_size that allows attackers to cause a     denial of service via a crafted HTML file. (bsc#1213324)
    - CVE-2023-38253: Fixed an out-of-bounds write in function growbuf_to_Str that allows attackers to cause a     denial of service via a crafted HTML file. (bsc#1213323)

Tenable has extracted the preceding description block directly from the SUSE security advisory.

Note that Nessus has not tested for these issues but has instead relied only on the application's self-reported version number.

ID	Name	Product	Family	Severity
258946	Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2023-38253	Nessus	Misc.	medium
239825	TencentOS Server 4: w3m (TSSA-2025:0165)	Nessus	Tencent Local Security Checks	high
427838	Alpine: multiple w3m packages: security update to 0.5.3_git20241203-r0	Tenable Cloud Security	Alpine Linux Local Security Checks	high
427838	Alpine: multiple w3m packages: security update to 0.5.3_git20241203-r0	Tenable Self-Hosted Container Security	Alpine Linux Local Security Checks	high
426673	Alpine: multiple w3m packages: security update to 0.5.3.20230718-r0	Tenable Cloud Security	Alpine Linux Local Security Checks	medium
426673	Alpine: multiple w3m packages: security update to 0.5.3.20230718-r0	Tenable Self-Hosted Container Security	Alpine Linux Local Security Checks	medium
194642	Fedora 40 : w3m (2024-aeb75f8b5b)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	high
192594	Fedora 39 : w3m (2024-3fc66f8bf3)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	high
192593	Fedora 38 : w3m (2024-38c2261ca0)	Nessus	Fedora Local Security Checks	high
185730	SUSE SLED15 / SLES15 / openSUSE 15 Security Update : w3m (SUSE-SU-2023:4439-1)	Nessus	SuSE Local Security Checks	medium

Detections

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CVE-2023-38253

medium

Tenable Plugins

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medium

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medium