CVE-2018-17481 Use after free in Chrome

What is CVE-2018-17481?

CVE-2018-17481 is a high-severity use after free vulnerability in Debian Debian Linux, published on 11 Dec 2018. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.

Official description

Incorrect object lifecycle handling in PDFium in Google Chrome prior to 71.0.3578.98 allowed a remote attacker to potentially exploit heap corruption via a crafted PDF file.

Weakness: CWE-787, CWE-416

Which versions are affected by CVE-2018-17481?

It affects 5 products.

Products include Debian Debian Linux, Google Chrome, Redhat Linux Desktop, Redhat Linux Server, Redhat Linux Workstation.

How do I fix CVE-2018-17481?

Upgrade to a fixed version.

Upgrade to the fixed version. These bugs are found with fuzzing and sanitisers and avoided by memory-safe languages. More about Use after free.

Is CVE-2018-17481 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2018-17481 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Other vulnerabilities in Debian Debian Linux

• CVE-2015-3306 ProFTPD Improper Access Control Exploited Critical 10.0
• CVE-2025-49113 RoundCube Webmail Deserialization of Untrusted Data Exploited Critical 9.9
• CVE-2026-24061 GNU InetUtils Argument Injection Exploited Critical 9.8
• CVE-2025-39682 Linux Kernel Improper Check for Unusual or Exceptional Conditions Exploited Critical 9.8
• CVE-2024-9680 Mozilla Firefox Use-After-Free Exploited Critical 9.8

All Debian Debian Linux vulnerabilities

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2018-17481, GHSA-4753-34xg-v688, UBUNTU-CVE-2018-17481.