CVE-2017-2669

Publication date 10 April 2017

Last updated 25 August 2025

Ubuntu priority

Medium

Why this priority?

Cvss 3 Severity Score

7.5 · High

Score breakdown

Description

Dovecot before version 2.2.29 is vulnerable to a denial of service. When 'dict' passdb and userdb were used for user authentication, the username sent by the IMAP/POP3 client was sent through var_expand() to perform %variable expansion. Sending specially crafted %variable fields could result in excessive memory usage causing the process to crash (and restart), or excessive CPU usage causing all authentications to hang.

Read the notes from the security team

Status

Package Ubuntu Release Status
dovecot 16.10 yakkety
Not affected
16.04 LTS xenial
Not affected
14.04 LTS trusty
Not affected
12.04 LTS precise
Not affected

Notes

tyhicks

Vulnerable versions: 2.2.26 - 2.2.28

Patch details

For informational purposes only. We recommend not to cherry-pick updates. How can I get the fixes?

Package Patch details
dovecot

Severity score breakdown

Parameter Value
Base score 7.5 · High
Attack vector Network
Attack complexity Low
Privileges required None
User interaction None
Scope Unchanged
Confidentiality None
Integrity impact None
Availability impact High
Vector CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

References

Related Ubuntu Security Notices (USN)

Other references