# CVE-2017-14318: Null dereference in n/a

> A missing check in Xen's grant table handling causes a NULL pointer dereference when flushing cache for special domains, leading to a denial of service.

- **Severity:** Medium 6.5 (`CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 12 Sep 2017
- **Updated:** 5 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** ALPINE-CVE-2017-14318, DEBIAN-CVE-2017-14318, GHSA-g75p-4v96-pxff, UBUNTU-CVE-2017-14318

## What is CVE-2017-14318?

CVE-2017-14318 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Xen Xen, published on 12 Sep 2017. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

An issue was discovered in Xen 4.5.x through 4.9.x. The function `__gnttab_cache_flush` handles GNTTABOP_cache_flush grant table operations. It checks to see if the calling domain is the owner of the page that is to be operated on. If it is not, the owner's grant table is checked to see if a grant mapping to the calling domain exists for the page in question. However, the function does not check to see if the owning domain actually has a grant table or not. Some special domains, such as `DOMID_XEN`, `DOMID_IO` and `DOMID_COW` are created without grant tables. Hence, if __gnttab_cache_flush operates on a page owned by these special domains, it will attempt to dereference a NULL pointer in the domain struct.

Weakness: CWE-476 (NULL Pointer Dereference)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2017-14318?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Xen Xen.

## How do I fix CVE-2017-14318?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2017-14318 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2017-14318 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Xen Xen

- [CVE-2017-10912](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-10912/): Privilege escalation in n/a (critical 10.0)
- [CVE-2017-10918](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-10918/): Memory corruption in n/a (critical 10.0)
- [CVE-2017-10920](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-10920/): Memory corruption in n/a (critical 10.0)
- [CVE-2017-10921](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-10921/): Memory corruption in n/a (critical 10.0)
- [CVE-2025-27466](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-27466/): Mutiple vulnerabilities in the Viridian interface (critical 9.8)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2017-14318 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2017-14318 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Xen Xen, published on 12 Sep 2017. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2017-14318 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Xen Xen. 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-2017-14318/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-14318/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2017-14318
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2017-14318
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2017-14318

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2017-14318/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.