# CVE-2016-9471: Other in Revive Adserver All versions before 3.2.5 and 4.0.0

> Attackers with user creation privileges can inject control characters into usernames to spoof identities, bypassing visual verification in the Revive Adserver interface.

- **Severity:** Low 3.1 (`CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:H/PR:H/UI:R/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:N`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** An administrator
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** A user has to click or open something
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 28 Mar 2017
- **Updated:** 6 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** GHSA-j7g3-qm5c-2j6r

## What is CVE-2016-9471?

CVE-2016-9471 is a low-severity vulnerability in Revive-Adserver Revive Adserver, published on 28 Mar 2017. An attacker needs administrator access to exploit it, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.

### Official description

Revive Adserver before 3.2.5 and 4.0.0 suffers from Special Element Injection. Usernames weren't properly sanitised when creating users on a Revive Adserver instance. Especially, control characters were not filtered, allowing apparently identical usernames to co-exist in the system, due to the fact that such characters are normally ignored when an HTML page is displayed in a browser. The issue could have therefore been exploited for user spoofing, although elevated privileges are required to create users within Revive Adserver.

Weakness: CWE-75 (Failure to Sanitize Special Elements into a Different Plane)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2016-9471?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Revive-Adserver Revive Adserver.

## How do I fix CVE-2016-9471?

No fix has been published for CVE-2016-9471 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2016-9471 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2016-9471 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Revive-Adserver Revive Adserver

- [CVE-2016-9124](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-9124/): Security feature bypass in Revive Adserver All versions before 3.2.3 (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2016-9125](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-9125/): Auth bypass in Revive Adserver All versions before 3.2.3 (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2017-5830](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-5830/): Deserialization in n/a (critical 9.8)
- [CVE-2016-9470](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-9470/): Other in Revive Adserver All versions before 3.2.5 and 4.0.0 (critical 9.0)
- [CVE-2026-50741](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-50741/): Code injection in Adserver (high 8.8)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2016-9471 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2016-9471 is a low-severity vulnerability in Revive-Adserver Revive Adserver, published on 28 Mar 2017. An attacker needs administrator access to exploit it, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2016-9471 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Revive-Adserver Revive Adserver. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-9471/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-9471/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2016-9471
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2016-9471
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2016-9471

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2016-9471/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.