What is CVE-2018-14438?

CVE-2018-14438 is a high-severity vulnerability in Wireshark, classified under Improper Input Validation. CVSS score: 7.5/10. Published 2018-07-20.

How severe is CVE-2018-14438?

High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.5 out of 10.

Improper input validation in Wireshark

CVE-2018-14438

In Wireshark through 2.6.2, the create_app_running_mutex function in wsutil/file_util.c calls SetSecurityDescriptorDacl to set a NULL DACL, which allows attackers to modify the access control arbitrarily.

Vulnerability class: Drupalgeddon 2 (CVE-2018-7600)

Published 2018-07-20 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 7.5 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.012 (66.7th percentile), scored 2026-10-03.

Low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, but still tracked. 67th percentile — 66.7% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.012 · newest: 0.012 · change: -0.000

Affected products

Wireshark

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-20 — Improper Input Validation

References

www.securityfocus.com/bid/104876 (VDB Entry, Third Party Advisory, vdb-entry)
bugs.wireshark.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi (Issue Tracking, Vendor Advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2018-14438?: CVE-2018-14438 is a high-severity vulnerability in Wireshark, classified under Improper Input Validation. CVSS score: 7.5/10. Published 2018-07-20.
How severe is CVE-2018-14438?: High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.5 out of 10.