What is CVE-2019-17544?

CVE-2019-17544 is a critical-severity vulnerability in GNU Aspell, classified under Out-of-bounds Read. CVSS score: 9.1/10. Published 2019-10-14.

How severe is CVE-2019-17544?

Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 9.1 out of 10.

Out-of-bounds Read in GNU Aspell

CVE-2019-17544

libaspell.a in GNU Aspell before 0.60.8 has a stack-based buffer over-read in acommon::unescape in common/getdata.cpp via an isolated \ character.

Vulnerability class: Buffer Overflow

Published 2019-10-14 · last modified 2026-06-17.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 9.1 (Critical). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.033 (87.9th percentile), scored 2026-09-30.

Low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days, but still tracked. 88th percentile — 87.9% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.033 · newest: 0.033 · change: 0.000

Affected products

GNU Aspell
Canonical Ubuntu Linux — versions 12.04, 14.04, 16.04

Weakness classification (CWE)

CWE-125 — Out-of-bounds Read

References

github.com/GNUAspell/aspell/commit/80fa26c74279fced8d778351cff19d1d8f44fe4e (Patch, Third Party Advisory)
github.com/GNUAspell/aspell/compare/rel-0.60.7...rel-0.60.8 (Third Party Advisory)
bugs.chromium.org/p/oss-fuzz/issues/detail (Third Party Advisory)
usn.ubuntu.com/4155-1/ (vendor-advisory, Third Party Advisory)
lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2019/10/msg00027.html (mailing-list)
usn.ubuntu.com/4155-2/ (vendor-advisory)
lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2021/07/msg00021.html (mailing-list)
www.debian.org/security/2021/dsa-4948 (vendor-advisory)

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2019-17544?: CVE-2019-17544 is a critical-severity vulnerability in GNU Aspell, classified under Out-of-bounds Read. CVSS score: 9.1/10. Published 2019-10-14.
How severe is CVE-2019-17544?: Critical severity. CVSS v3 base score is 9.1 out of 10.