Saturday, May 24, 2025
HomeCyber Security NewsMemory Corruption Flaw in ncurses API Library Exposes Linux and macOS Systems

Memory Corruption Flaw in ncurses API Library Exposes Linux and macOS Systems

Published on

SIEM as a Service

Follow Us on Google News

Multiple memory corruption vulnerabilities have been discovered in the ncurses library, which various programs use on multiple operating systems like Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX) OS, Linux OS, macOS, and FreeBSD. 

Threat actors can chain these vulnerabilities with environment variable poisoning attacks to gain escalated privileges and run codes under the name of the target program or perform other malicious actions.

Memory corruption is one of the common vulnerabilities found in modern programs that could allow threat actors to gain unauthorized access by modifying a program’s memory. The impact of this vulnerability ranges from leaking sensitive information to executing arbitrary code with escalated privileges.

- Advertisement - Google News

However, Microsoft has disclosed these vulnerabilities with the ncurses maintainers, which have now been successfully patched.

Document
Get a Demo

Start protecting your SaaS data in just a few minutes!

With DoControl, you can keep your SaaS applications and data safe and secure by creating workflows tailored to your needs. It’s an easy and efficient way to identify and manage risks. You can mitigate the risk and exposure of your organization’s SaaS applications in just a few simple steps.

CVE-2023-29491: Memory Corruption via malformed data

This vulnerability exists in the ncurses library before 6.4 20230408, which could allow threat actors with local privileges to trigger security-based memory corruption. This can be done with the help of malformed data in the terminfo database file, which is found in $HOME/.terminfo, or with environment variables like TERMINFO or TERM.

This particular vulnerability is associated with several internal things, such as Heap out-of-bounds during terminfo database file parsing, parameterized string type confusion, stack information leak, and denial of service with canceled strings.

Terminfo database file consists of optional extended entries like Boolean, numeric, and strings. These entries are user-defined entries and are parsed by the _nc_read_termtype function, which was found to be capable of writing beyond the boundaries of a heap-allocated chunk.

The ncurses source code looks for CANCELLED_STRING and converts them to ABSENT_STRING, which is done only for ordinary strings, whereas extended strings do not get converted. Additionally, strings beginning with “k” are treated as keypad functionality, which can allow a threat actor to specify an extended string, resulting in ncurses dereference eventually causing a denial of service.

Microsoft has published a complete report about these vulnerabilities, providing detailed information about variable poisoning, exploitation, and other information.

Users are recommended to upgrade to the latest version of the ncurses library in order to prevent this vulnerability from getting exploited.

Keep informed about the latest Cyber Security News by following us on Google NewsLinkedinTwitter, and Facebook.

Gurubaran
Gurubaran
Gurubaran is a co-founder of Cyber Security News and GBHackers On Security. He has 10+ years of experience as a Security Consultant, Editor, and Analyst in cybersecurity, technology, and communications.

Latest articles

Zero-Trust Policy Bypass Enables Exploitation of Vulnerabilities and Manipulation of NHI Secrets

A new project has exposed a critical attack vector that exploits protocol vulnerabilities to...

Threat Actor Sells Burger King Backup System RCE Vulnerability for $4,000

A threat actor known as #LongNight has reportedly put up for sale remote code...

Chinese Nexus Hackers Exploit Ivanti Endpoint Manager Mobile Vulnerability

Ivanti disclosed two critical vulnerabilities, identified as CVE-2025-4427 and CVE-2025-4428, affecting Ivanti Endpoint Manager...

Hackers Target macOS Users with Fake Ledger Apps to Deploy Malware

Hackers are increasingly targeting macOS users with malicious clones of Ledger Live, the popular...

Resilience at Scale

Why Application Security is Non-Negotiable

The resilience of your digital infrastructure directly impacts your ability to scale. And yet, application security remains a critical weak link for most organizations.

Application Security is no longer just a defensive play—it’s the cornerstone of cyber resilience and sustainable growth. In this webinar, Karthik Krishnamoorthy (CTO of Indusface) and Phani Deepak Akella (VP of Marketing – Indusface), will share how AI-powered application security can help organizations build resilience by

Discussion points


Protecting at internet scale using AI and behavioral-based DDoS & bot mitigation.
Autonomously discovering external assets and remediating vulnerabilities within 72 hours, enabling secure, confident scaling.
Ensuring 100% application availability through platforms architected for failure resilience.
Eliminating silos with real-time correlation between attack surface and active threats for rapid, accurate mitigation

More like this

Zero-Trust Policy Bypass Enables Exploitation of Vulnerabilities and Manipulation of NHI Secrets

A new project has exposed a critical attack vector that exploits protocol vulnerabilities to...

Threat Actor Sells Burger King Backup System RCE Vulnerability for $4,000

A threat actor known as #LongNight has reportedly put up for sale remote code...

Chinese Nexus Hackers Exploit Ivanti Endpoint Manager Mobile Vulnerability

Ivanti disclosed two critical vulnerabilities, identified as CVE-2025-4427 and CVE-2025-4428, affecting Ivanti Endpoint Manager...