CVE-2024-54731
📋 TL;DR
CVE-2024-54731 is a stack consumption vulnerability in cpdf that allows denial of service through crafted PDF documents. Attackers can cause the application to crash by triggering excessive recursion or deep function calls. This affects all users processing untrusted PDF files with vulnerable cpdf versions.
💻 Affected Systems
- cpdf
⚠️ Manual Verification Required
This CVE does not have specific version information in our database, so automatic vulnerability detection cannot determine if your system is affected.
Why? The CVE database entry doesn't specify which versions are vulnerable (no version ranges provided by the vendor/NVD).
🔒 Custom verification scripts are available for registered users. Sign up free to download automated test scripts.
- Review the CVE details at NVD
- Check vendor security advisories for your specific version
- Test if the vulnerability is exploitable in your environment
- Consider updating to the latest version as a precaution
⚠️ Risk & Real-World Impact
Worst Case
Complete denial of service where cpdf crashes when processing malicious PDFs, potentially disrupting PDF processing workflows and causing service unavailability.
Likely Case
Application crashes when processing specially crafted PDF documents, requiring manual restart of affected processes.
If Mitigated
Limited impact with proper input validation and resource monitoring in place, potentially causing temporary processing delays.
🎯 Exploit Status
Exploitation requires only a crafted PDF document, making it relatively simple to trigger.
🛠️ Fix & Mitigation
✅ Official Fix
Patch Version: Version after 2.8 (check latest release)
Vendor Advisory: https://github.com/johnwhitington/cpdf-source/issues/366
Restart Required: Yes
Instructions:
1. Check current cpdf version. 2. Update to latest version from official repository. 3. Restart any services using cpdf. 4. Test with known safe PDFs to verify functionality.
🔧 Temporary Workarounds
Input validation and sandboxing
allImplement strict input validation for PDF files and run cpdf in isolated environments
# Use containerization: docker run --read-only --memory=512m -v /safe/path:/input cpdf
Resource limiting
linuxLimit stack size and memory usage for cpdf processes
ulimit -s 8192
ulimit -v 1048576
🧯 If You Can't Patch
- Implement strict file upload validation to reject suspicious PDF files
- Monitor cpdf processes for abnormal resource consumption and restart automatically
🔍 How to Verify
Check if Vulnerable:
Check cpdf version: cpdf --version. If version is 2.8 or earlier, system is vulnerable.Check Version:
cpdf --versionVerify Fix Applied:
After updating, verify version is above 2.8 and test processing of various PDF files.📡 Detection & Monitoring
Log Indicators:
- Segmentation fault errors
- Stack overflow messages
- Abnormal process termination
Network Indicators:
- Multiple failed PDF processing requests
- Unusual PDF upload patterns
SIEM Query:
process_name="cpdf" AND (event_type="crash" OR error_message="segmentation fault")