CVE-2018-13030

Vulnerability

A global buffer overflow vulnerability exists in the build_huffman function within stb_image.c of jpeg-compressor version 0.1. The flaw occurs when a specially crafted JPEG image is processed, leading to a read of size 4 from a global buffer beyond its allocated bounds. The issue is triggered at line 1120 in extend_receive and cascades through decode_block and parse_entropy_coded_data. The affected versions include jpeg-compressor v0.1 [1].

Exploitation

An attacker can exploit this vulnerability by providing a malicious JPEG file to the encoder binary. The proof-of-concept crash file is named crash_global_buffer_overflow. When executed with the command ./encoder ./crash_global_buffer_overflow 1.jpeg 50, the program crashes due to the global buffer overflow. No authentication or special network access is required; the attack vector is local file processing [1].

Impact

Successful exploitation results in a denial of service (application crash). The AddressSanitizer report confirms a global-buffer-overflow with a READ of size 4. While the description mentions possibly other unspecified impact, the reference only confirms the crash. The attacker gains no additional privileges or data access beyond causing the program to terminate abnormally [1].

Mitigation

As of the publication date (2018-06-30), no official fix or patched version has been released for jpeg-compressor v0.1. Users should avoid processing untrusted JPEG files with this library until a patch is made available. The project appears to be unmaintained, so alternative JPEG decoding libraries should be considered [1].