CVE-2019-17212
Buffer overflows were discovered in the CoAP library in Arm Mbed OS 5.14.0. The CoAP parser is...
Buffer overflows were discovered in the CoAP library in Arm Mbed OS 5.14.0. The CoAP parser is responsible for parsing received CoAP packets. The function sn_coap_parser_options_parse() parses CoAP input linearly using a while loop. Once an option is parsed in a loop, the current point (packet_data_pptr) is increased correspondingly. The pointer is restricted by the size of the received buffer, as well as by the 0xFF delimiter byte. Inside each while loop, the check of the value of packet_data_pptr is not strictly enforced. More specifically, inside a loop, packet_data_pptr could be increased and then dereferenced without checking. Moreover, there are many other functions in the format of sn_coap_parser_*() that do not check whether the pointer is within the bounds of the allocated buffer. All of these lead to heap-based or stack-based buffer overflows, depending on how the CoAP packet buffer is allocated.
Attack profile
How easy it is to exploit
- Attack vector
- Network
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges needed
- None
- User interaction
- None
What an attacker can affect
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
Exploit likelihood
What each source reports
NVD Score used
9.8
Buffer overflows were discovered in the CoAP library in Arm Mbed OS 5.14.0. The CoAP parser is responsible for parsing received CoAP packets. The function sn_coap_parser_options_parse() parses CoAP input linearly using a while loop. Once an option is parsed in a loop, the current point (packet_data_pptr) is increased correspondingly. The pointer is restricted by the size of the received buffer, as well as by the 0xFF delimiter byte. Inside each while loop, the check of the value of packet_data_pptr is not strictly enforced. More specifically, inside a loop, packet_data_pptr could be increased and then dereferenced without checking. Moreover, there are many other functions in the format of sn_coap_parser_*() that do not check whether the pointer is within the bounds of the allocated buffer. All of these lead to heap-based or stack-based buffer overflows, depending on how the CoAP packet buffer is allocated.
- Record
CVE-2019-17212- CVSS 3.1
- 9.8 Critical
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H - CVSS 2.0
- 10.0 High
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C - Weakness
- CWE-129, CWE-787
- Updated
- 2026-11-02
CVE List No score
Buffer overflows were discovered in the CoAP library in Arm Mbed OS 5.14.0. The CoAP parser is responsible for parsing received CoAP packets. The function sn_coap_parser_options_parse() parses CoAP input linearly using a while loop. Once an option is parsed in a loop, the current point (packet_data_pptr) is increased correspondingly. The pointer is restricted by the size of the received buffer, as well as by the 0xFF delimiter byte. Inside each while loop, the check of the value of packet_data_pptr is not strictly enforced. More specifically, inside a loop, packet_data_pptr could be increased and then dereferenced without checking. Moreover, there are many other functions in the format of sn_coap_parser_*() that do not check whether the pointer is within the bounds of the allocated buffer. All of these lead to heap-based or stack-based buffer overflows, depending on how the CoAP packet buffer is allocated.
- Record
CVE-2019-17212- Updated
- 2026-11-02
EUVDEUVD-2019-7632 No score
Buffer overflows were discovered in the CoAP library in Arm Mbed OS 5.14.0. The CoAP parser is responsible for parsing received CoAP packets. The function sn_coap_parser_options_parse() parses CoAP input linearly using a while loop. Once an option is parsed in a loop, the current point (packet_data_pptr) is increased correspondingly. The pointer is restricted by the size of the received buffer, as well as by the 0xFF delimiter byte. Inside each while loop, the check of the value of packet_data_pptr is not strictly enforced. More specifically, inside a loop, packet_data_pptr could be increased and then dereferenced without checking. Moreover, there are many other functions in the format of sn_coap_parser_*() that do not check whether the pointer is within the bounds of the allocated buffer. All of these lead to heap-based or stack-based buffer overflows, depending on how the CoAP packet buffer is allocated.
- Record
EUVD-2019-7632- Updated
- 2026-11-03
GitHub AdvisoriesGHSA-mh95-3gr3-7p2r No score
Buffer overflows were discovered in the CoAP library in Arm Mbed OS 5.14.0. The CoAP parser is...
Buffer overflows were discovered in the CoAP library in Arm Mbed OS 5.14.0. The CoAP parser is responsible for parsing received CoAP packets. The function sn_coap_parser_options_parse() parses CoAP input linearly using a while loop. Once an option is parsed in a loop, the current point (packet_data_pptr) is increased correspondingly. The pointer is restricted by the size of the received buffer, as well as by the 0xFF delimiter byte. Inside each while loop, the check of the value of packet_data_pptr is not strictly enforced. More specifically, inside a loop, packet_data_pptr could be increased and then dereferenced without checking. Moreover, there are many other functions in the format of sn_coap_parser_*() that do not check whether the pointer is within the bounds of the allocated buffer. All of these lead to heap-based or stack-based buffer overflows, depending on how the CoAP packet buffer is allocated.
- Record
GHSA-mh95-3gr3-7p2r- Updated
- 2026-11-02
Affected products
History
| Recorded | Changed | Sources |
|---|---|---|
| aliases | EUVD | |
| first indexed | CVE List, GitHub Advisories, NVD |
Dates are when Every CVE recorded each change. Upstream dates may differ.
In short
CVE-2019-17212 is a critical vulnerability (CVSS 9.8) in Mbed, published November 5, 2019. No source lists public exploit code. EPSS puts the chance of exploitation in the next 30 days at 3.06%, the 87th percentile. No source names a fixed version.