CVE-2018-16509

HIGHNVD 7.87.8—
EchelonGraph scoreMEDIUM confidence

Score 7.8 from GitHub Security Advisory (severity: HIGH) published 2022-05-13. NVD baseline CVSS 7.8; sources differ by 0.0.

Triggered by: GitHub Security Advisory CVSS
Sources: ghsa, nvd
Weaponized
7.8
EchelonGraph verdictPatch this weekExploitation is likely or a public exploit exists.
  • High exploitation likelihood — EPSS 92%
CISA-KEV: Not listedEPSS: 92%CVSS: 7.8Exploit: NoneExposed: 0

A fix is available — apply it.

An issue was discovered in Artifex Ghostscript before 9.24. Incorrect "restoration of privilege" checking during handling of /invalidaccess exceptions could be used by attackers able to supply crafted PostScript to execute code using the "pipe" instruction.

CVSS v3
7.8
EG Score
7.8(medium)
EPSS
99.8%
KEV
Not listed

Published

September 5, 2018

Last Modified

November 21, 2024

References (30)

Patch Availability(3)

Vendor / EcosystemFixed in / PatchReleasedSource
ubuntulibgs9-common (9.10~dfsg-0ubuntu10.13) @ trusty2026-05-23ubuntu
redhatghostscript-0:8.70-24.el6_10.22018-12-03redhat
redhatghostscript-0:9.07-29.el7_5.22018-10-16redhat

Patches are aggregated from vendor advisories (Red Hat, Microsoft, Cisco, GitHub) and package ecosystems (OSV, GHSA). Multiple rows for the same upstream release have been deduplicated.

All Vendor Advisories

(3)

Every vendor that published an advisory referencing this CVE — pulled from our cve_vendor_advisories aggregation. Click any row for the vendor's original advisory page.

Data Freshness Timeline

(refreshed 2× in last 7d / 6× in last 30d)

Each row is a source pipeline that fetched or updated this CVE on that date, with what changed. For example, "NVD update" means NVD published or revised its analysis for this CVE; "MITRE cvelistV5" means we ingested or refreshed it from the CNA feed. Most recent first.

  1. 2026-06-30 23:19 UTCEPSS rescore
  2. 2026-06-30 23:19 UTCEPSS rescore
  3. 2026-06-24 03:59 UTCOSV refresh
  4. 2026-06-23 21:30 UTCEPSS rescore
  5. 2026-06-15 17:45 UTCEPSS rescore
  6. 2026-06-10 22:16 UTCEPSS rescore
  7. 2026-06-07 08:50 UTCOSV refresh
  8. 2026-06-06 13:45 UTCEPSS rescore
  9. 2026-06-06 13:45 UTCEPSS rescore
  10. 2026-06-02 20:11 UTCEPSS rescore
  11. 2026-06-02 20:11 UTCEPSS rescore
  12. 2026-06-01 13:49 UTCEPSS rescore
  13. 2026-05-29 13:41 UTCEPSS rescore
  14. 2026-05-28 13:42 UTCEPSS rescore
  15. 2026-05-28 13:42 UTCEPSS rescore
  16. 2026-05-26 13:42 UTCEPSS rescore
  17. 2026-05-26 13:42 UTCEPSS rescore
  18. 2026-05-23 02:36 UTCEG score recompute
  19. 2026-05-23 02:36 UTCVendor advisory
  20. 2026-05-23 02:36 UTCGHSA enrichment

Publicly available exploits

(4 references)

Working exploit code is in the public domain (1 Metasploit module) (2 GitHub PoCs) (1 Exploit-DB entry). Defenders should treat patch urgency accordingly — public PoCs typically lead to mass-exploitation within 24-72 hours.

  • GitHub PoCknqyf263/CVE-2018-16509
    First seen Nov 17, 2018

    CVE-2018-16509 (Ghostscript contains multiple -dSAFER sandbox bypass vulnerabilities)

    Open source ↗
  • GitHub PoCfarisv/PIL-RCE-Ghostscript-CVE-2018-16509
    First seen Oct 15, 2018

    PoC + Docker Environment for Python PIL/Pillow Remote Shell Command Execution via Ghostscript CVE-2018-16509

    Open source ↗
  • Exploit-DBEDB-45369✓ verified
    First seen Sep 10, 2018

    Ghostscript - Failed Restore Command Execution (Metasploit)

    Open source ↗
  • Metasploitexploit/multi/fileformat/ghostscript_failed_restore✓ verified
    First seen Aug 21, 2018

    Ghostscript Failed Restore Command Execution

    Open source ↗

Related CVEs(same vendor)

Frequently asked(5)

What is CVE-2018-16509?
CVE-2018-16509 is a high vulnerability published on September 5, 2018. An issue was discovered in Artifex Ghostscript before 9.24. Incorrect "restoration of privilege" checking during handling of /invalidaccess exceptions could be used by attackers able to supply crafted PostScript to execute code using the "pipe" instruction.
When was CVE-2018-16509 disclosed?
CVE-2018-16509 was first published in the National Vulnerability Database on September 5, 2018, with the most recent update on November 21, 2024. EchelonGraph re-ingests CVE updates from NVD on a 2-hour cycle, so this page reflects the latest published state.
Is CVE-2018-16509 actively exploited?
CVE-2018-16509 is not currently on CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. FIRST EPSS estimates a 99.8% percentile likelihood of exploitation in the next 30 days — higher percentiles indicate greater predicted risk.
What is the CVSS score of CVE-2018-16509?
CVE-2018-16509 has a CVSS v3 base score of 7.8 (NVD).
How do I remediate CVE-2018-16509?
Patch to the fixed version published by the affected vendor. Where vendor advisories exist for CVE-2018-16509, EchelonGraph cross-links them in the Vendor Advisories panel below — those typically contain the canonical remediation steps, fixed version numbers, and any vendor-specific mitigations.

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