Security advisory
VNC server implementation in Quick Emulator (QEMU) 2.11.0 and older was found to be vulnerable to an unbounded memory allocation issue, as it did not throttle the framebuffer updates sent to its client. If the client did not consume these updates, VNC server allocates growing memory to hold onto this data. A malicious remote VNC client could use this flaw to cause DoS to the server host.
- Products
- Not specified
- Affected versions
- Not specified
- Fixed versions
- Not specified
- CVEs
- CVE-2017-15124
- Confirmed fixed CVEs
- Not specified
- Updated in this feed
- 1 Nov 2026, 07:37 UTC · Revision 1
Source evidence
VNC server implementation in Quick Emulator (QEMU) 2.11.0 and older was found to be vulnerable to an unbounded memory allocation issue, as it did not throttle the framebuffer updates sent to its client. If the client did not consume these updates, VNC server allocates growing memory to hold onto this data. A malicious remote VNC client could use this flaw to cause DoS to the server host.
osv:CVE-2017-15124
Complete source record
{
"id": "4d4da3b62587e60714e633fc167954c45e28cd64d9da5b5dabbc19ba9446446f",
"url": "https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2017-15124",
"method": "structured",
"payload": {
"kind": "advisory",
"title": "CVE-2017-15124",
"summary": "VNC server implementation in Quick Emulator (QEMU) 2.11.0 and older was found to be vulnerable to an unbounded memory allocation issue, as it did not throttle the framebuffer updates sent to its client. If the client did not consume these updates, VNC server allocates growing memory to hold onto this data. A malicious remote VNC client could use this flaw to cause DoS to the server host.",
"evidence": "osv:CVE-2017-15124",
"products": [],
"severity": "high",
"structured": {
"id": "CVE-2017-15124",
"aliases": [
"CVE-2017-15124"
],
"metrics": [
{
"type": "CVSS_V3",
"score": "CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H"
}
],
"affected": [
{
"ranges": [
{
"repo": "https://github.com/qemu/qemu",
"type": "GIT",
"events": [
{
"introduced": "0"
},
{
"last_affected": "0a0dc59d27527b78a195c2d838d28b7b49e5a639"
}
],
"database_specific": {
"extracted_events": [
{
"cpe": "cpe:2.3:a:qemu:qemu:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*",
"range": [
{
"introduced": "0"
},
{
"last_affected": "2.11.0"
}
],
"source": "CPE_RANGE"
}
]
}
}
],
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],
"database_specific": {
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}
},
{
"ranges": [
{
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"type": "GIT",
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"database_specific": {
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"range": [
{
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},
{
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}
],
"source": "CPE_RANGE"
}
]
}
}
],
"versions": [
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],
"modified": "2026-10-24T10:30:55.898912563Z",
"provider": "osv",
"references": [
"https://usn.ubuntu.com/3575-1/",
"https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2018:0816",
"https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2018:1104",
"https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2018:1113",
"https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2018:3062",
"https://www.debian.org/security/2018/dsa-4213",
"https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1525195"
],
"provider_metadata": {}
},
"related_cves": [
{
"value": "CVE-2017-15124",
"evidence": "/id"
}
],
"security_relevant": true,
"severity_evidence": "/severity/0/score"
},
"source_id": "core-osv",
"document_id": 438537,
"published_at": "2018-01-09T21:29:00.343+00:00"
}