What is CVE-2016-7979?

CVE-2016-7979 is a critical-severity vulnerability in Artifex Ghostscript, classified under Incorrect Type Conversion or Cast. CVSS score: 9.8/10. Published 2017-05-23.

How severe is CVE-2016-7979?

Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 9.8 out of 10.

Vulnerability in Artifex Ghostscript

CVE-2016-7979

Ghostscript before 9.21 might allow remote attackers to bypass the SAFER mode protection mechanism and consequently execute arbitrary code by leveraging type confusion in .initialize_dsc_parser.

Published 2017-05-23 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 9.8 (Critical). Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.064 (93.7th percentile), scored 2026-10-29.

Low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, but still tracked. 94th percentile — 93.7% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.064 · newest: 0.064 · change: 0.000

Affected products

Artifex Ghostscript

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-704 — Incorrect Type Conversion or Cast

References

www.debian.org/security/2016/dsa-3691 (vendor-advisory)
rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2017-0013.html (vendor-advisory)
bugs.ghostscript.com/show_bug.cgi (Patch, Issue Tracking)
rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2017-0014.html (vendor-advisory)
git.ghostscript.com/
www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2016/10/05/15 (mailing-list, Patch, Mailing List)
www.securityfocus.com/bid/95337 (VDB Entry, Third Party Advisory, vdb-entry)
security.gentoo.org/glsa/201702-31 (vendor-advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2016-7979?: CVE-2016-7979 is a critical-severity vulnerability in Artifex Ghostscript, classified under Incorrect Type Conversion or Cast. CVSS score: 9.8/10. Published 2017-05-23.
How severe is CVE-2016-7979?: Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 9.8 out of 10.