CVE-2015-8736

medium

Published 2016-01-04 · Modified 2026-05-06

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CVSS v3

5.5

CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

CVSS v4 NEW

—

not yet in upstream

VIR risk

6.5

Description

The mp2t_find_next_pcr function in wiretap/mp2t.c in the MP2T file parser in Wireshark 2.0.x before 2.0.1 does not reserve memory for a trailer, which allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (stack-based buffer overflow and application crash) via a crafted file.

Predictions

Exploit likelihood

55%

Patch ETA

—

Heuristic predictions, AS-IS, for prioritization only.

Mitigations

No mitigations published for this CVE yet.

The vendor-content worker queues fetches as references arrive (check back in a few minutes). Or — if you've already worked around this in production — publish your fix to the community-verified tier.

✚ Propose a mitigation on Community → Mitigations published via the community go through AI scoring + 2 human reviewers + 7-day silent objection window before landing here with source_tier=community-verified.

Exploits

Public proof-of-concept code below. AS-IS, for defenders and authorised testing only.

Exploit-DB

EDB-38997 dos multiple verified text · 3 KB

Google Security Research · 2015-12-16

Wireshark - file_read 'wtap_read_bytes_or_eof/mp2t_find_next_pcr' Stack Buffer Overflow

text exploit Source: Exploit-DB

Source: https://code.google.com/p/google-security-research/issues/detail?id=655

The following crash due to a stack-based buffer overflow can be observed in an ASAN build of Wireshark (current git master), by feeding a malformed file to tshark ("$ ./tshark -nVxr /path/to/file"):

--- cut ---
==3325==ERROR: AddressSanitizer: stack-buffer-overflow on address 0x7fff80063d1c at pc 0x0000004aaf56 bp 0x7fff80063a50 sp 0x7fff80063200
WRITE of size 202 at 0x7fff80063d1c thread T0
    #0 0x4aaf55 in __asan_memcpy llvm/projects/compiler-rt/lib/asan/asan_interceptors.cc:393
    #1 0x7fb265728fad in file_read wireshark/wiretap/file_wrappers.c:1222:13
    #2 0x7fb2658ae866 in wtap_read_bytes_or_eof wireshark/wiretap/wtap.c:1363:15
    #3 0x7fb265783fac in mp2t_find_next_pcr wireshark/wiretap/mp2t.c:178:14
    #4 0x7fb265782bfa in mp2t_bits_per_second wireshark/wiretap/mp2t.c:236:10
    #5 0x7fb2657823a0 in mp2t_open wireshark/wiretap/mp2t.c:363:14
    #6 0x7fb265716911 in wtap_open_offline wireshark/wiretap/file_access.c:1042:13
    #7 0x51bd1d in cf_open wireshark/tshark.c:4195:9
    #8 0x51584e in main wireshark/tshark.c:2188:9

Address 0x7fff80063d1c is located in stack of thread T0 at offset 220 in frame
    #0 0x7fb265783cdf in mp2t_find_next_pcr wireshark/wiretap/mp2t.c:170

  This frame has 1 object(s):
    [32, 220) 'buffer' <== Memory access at offset 220 overflows this variable
HINT: this may be a false positive if your program uses some custom stack unwind mechanism or swapcontext
      (longjmp and C++ exceptions *are* supported)
SUMMARY: AddressSanitizer: stack-buffer-overflow llvm/projects/compiler-rt/lib/asan/asan_interceptors.cc:393 in __asan_memcpy
Shadow bytes around the buggy address:
  0x100070004750: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
  0x100070004760: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
  0x100070004770: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
  0x100070004780: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 f1 f1 f1 f1 00 00 00 00
  0x100070004790: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
=>0x1000700047a0: 00 00 00[04]f3 f3 f3 f3 f3 f3 f3 f3 00 00 00 00
  0x1000700047b0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
  0x1000700047c0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
  0x1000700047d0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
  0x1000700047e0: f1 f1 f1 f1 00 f2 f2 f2 00 f2 f2 f2 02 f2 02 f2
  0x1000700047f0: 04 f3 f3 f3 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
Shadow byte legend (one shadow byte represents 8 application bytes):
  Addressable:           00
  Partially addressable: 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 
  Heap left redzone:       fa
  Heap right redzone:      fb
  Freed heap region:       fd
  Stack left redzone:      f1
  Stack mid redzone:       f2
  Stack right redzone:     f3
  Stack partial redzone:   f4
  Stack after return:      f5
  Stack use after scope:   f8
  Global redzone:          f9
  Global init order:       f6
  Poisoned by user:        f7
  Container overflow:      fc
  Array cookie:            ac
  Intra object redzone:    bb
  ASan internal:           fe
  Left alloca redzone:     ca
  Right alloca redzone:    cb
==3325==ABORTING
--- cut ---

The crash was reported at https://bugs.wireshark.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11820. Attached are two files which trigger the crash.


Proof of Concept:
https://gitlab.com/exploit-database/exploitdb-bin-sploits/-/raw/main/bin-sploits/38997.zip

OS impact

Debian Fixed 5 releases

Version	Status	Fixed in
trixie	Fixed	`2.0.1+g59ea380-1`
sid	Fixed	`2.0.1+g59ea380-1`
forky	Fixed	`2.0.1+g59ea380-1`
bullseye	Fixed	`2.0.1+g59ea380-1`
bookworm	Fixed	`2.0.1+g59ea380-1`

Application impact

Vendor	Product	Versions	Fixed
wireshark	wireshark	`2.0.0`

References

CWEs

CWE-20

Community-verified mitigations for this CVE will appear above when contributors publish them.

Verify integrity in audit chain (admin only). AS-IS.