What is CVE-2016-4952?

CVE-2016-4952 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Qemu, classified under Out-of-bounds Write. CVSS score: 6.0/10. Published 2016-09-02.

How severe is CVE-2016-4952?

Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 6.0 out of 10.

Is CVE-2016-4952 known to be exploited?

3 public proof-of-concept repositories are indexed. Not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

Buffer overflow in Qemu

CVE-2016-4952

QEMU (aka Quick Emulator), when built with VMWARE PVSCSI paravirtual SCSI bus emulation support, allows local guest OS administrators to cause a denial of service (out-of-bounds array access) via vectors related to the (1) PVSCSI_CMD_SETUP_RINGS or (2) PVSCSI_CMD_SETUP_MSG_RING SCSI command.

Vulnerability class: Buffer Overflow

Published 2016-09-02 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 6.0 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.004 (28.2th percentile), scored 2026-09-30.

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 28th percentile — 28.2% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.004 · newest: 0.004 · change: 0.000

Affected products

Qemu
Canonical Ubuntu Linux — versions 12.04, 14.04, 16.04
Debian Linux — versions 8.0

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-787 — Out-of-bounds Write

Public proof-of-concept exploits

References

www.ubuntu.com/usn/USN-3047-1 (vendor-advisory, Third Party Advisory)
www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2016/05/23/1 (mailing-list, Mailing List, Third Party Advisory)
www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2016/05/23/4 (mailing-list, Mailing List, Third Party Advisory)
lists.gnu.org/archive/html/qemu-devel/2016-05/msg03774.html (mailing-list, Patch, Mailing List, Third Party Advisory)
www.ubuntu.com/usn/USN-3047-2 (vendor-advisory, Third Party Advisory)
bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi (Third Party Advisory, Issue Tracking)
lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2018/11/msg00038.html (mailing-list, Mailing List, Third Party Advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2016-4952?: CVE-2016-4952 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Qemu, classified under Out-of-bounds Write. CVSS score: 6.0/10. Published 2016-09-02.
How severe is CVE-2016-4952?: Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 6.0 out of 10.
Is CVE-2016-4952 known to be exploited?: 3 public proof-of-concept repositories are indexed. Not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.