Poppler ia a library for rendering PDF files, and examining or modifying their structure. A use-after-free (write) vulnerability has been detected in versions Poppler prior to 25.10.0 within the StructTreeRoot class. The issue arises from the use of raw pointers to elements of a `std::vector`, which can lead to dangling pointers when the vector is resized. The vulnerability stems from the way that refToParentMap stores references to `std::vector` elements using raw pointers. These pointers may become invalid when the vector is resized. This vulnerability is a common security problem involving the use of raw pointers to `std::vectors`. Internally, `std::vector `stores its elements in a dynamically allocated array. When the array reaches its capacity and a new element is added, the vector reallocates a larger block of memory and moves all the existing elements to the new location. At this point if any pointers to elements are stored before a resize occurs, they become dangling pointers once the reallocation happens. Version 25.10.0 contains a patch for the issue.
https://securitylab.github.com/advisories/GHSL-2025-042_poppler/
https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/poppler/poppler/-/merge_requests/1884#note_3114334
https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/poppler/poppler/-/merge_requests/1884
Published: 2025-10-10
Updated: 2025-10-14
Base Score: 3.6
Vector: CVSS2#AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:P
Severity: Low
Base Score: 7.3
Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Severity: High
Base Score: 8.6
Vector: CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
Severity: High
EPSS: 0.00013