Description
Stack-based buffer overflow in emacs allows user-assisted attackers to cause a denial of service (application crash) and possibly have unspecified other impact via a large precision value in an integer format string specifier to the format function, as demonstrated via a certain "emacs -batch -eval" command line.
Fixed in Linux distributions
Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.
Debian
Security tracker ↗Azure Linux
| Release | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| Azure Linux 3 | emacs | 29.1-1 | — |
Advisories 2
- DTSA-99-1 emacs22 - buffer overflow Debian Security (DSA / DLA) · Mar 9, 2026
- DTSA-98-1 emacs21 - buffer overflow Debian Security (DSA / DLA) · Mar 9, 2026
References
- 27965 third-party-advisory
- USN-607-1 vendor-advisory
- 27984 third-party-advisory
- http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=200297
- ADV-2008-0924 vdb-entry
- SUSE-SR:2007:025 vendor-advisory
- 29420 third-party-advisory
- APPLE-SA-2008-03-18 vendor-advisory
- emacs-unspecified-bo(38904) vdb-entry
- MDVSA-2008:034 vendor-advisory
- 30109 third-party-advisory
- GLSA-200712-03 vendor-advisory
- http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=307562
- 28838 third-party-advisory
- SUSE-SR:2008:003 vendor-advisory