# CVE-2020-15701: Unhandled exception in apport

> A local attacker can cause a denial of service in the Ubuntu apport crash reporter by providing a malformed XML file with a string mtime attribute.

- **Severity:** Medium 5.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/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:** 6 Aug 2020
- **Updated:** 16 Sep 2024
- **Also known as:** GHSA-r3r2-rv2r-78wf, UBUNTU-CVE-2020-15701

## What is CVE-2020-15701?

CVE-2020-15701 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Canonical Ubuntu Linux, published on 6 Aug 2020. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

An unhandled exception in check_ignored() in apport/report.py can be exploited by a local attacker to cause a denial of service. If the mtime attribute is a string value in apport-ignore.xml, it will trigger an unhandled exception, resulting in a crash. Fixed in 2.20.1-0ubuntu2.24, 2.20.9-0ubuntu7.16, 2.20.11-0ubuntu27.6.

Weakness: CWE-755 (Improper Handling of Exceptional Conditions)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2020-15701?

It affects 2 products.


Products: Canonical Apport, Canonical Ubuntu Linux.

## How do I fix CVE-2020-15701?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2020-15701 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2020-15701 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Canonical Ubuntu Linux

- [CVE-2021-25682](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-25682/): apport improperly parses /proc/pid/status (high 8.8)
- [CVE-2021-25683](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-25683/): apport improperly parses /proc/pid/stat (high 8.8)
- [CVE-2021-25684](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-25684/): apport can be stalled by reading a FIFO (high 8.8)
- [CVE-2021-3899](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-3899/): Race condition in Apport (high 7.8)
- [CVE-2022-1242](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-1242/): Other in Apport (high 7.8)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2020-15701 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2020-15701 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Canonical Ubuntu Linux, published on 6 Aug 2020. 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-2020-15701 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Canonical Ubuntu Linux. 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-2020-15701/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2020-15701/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2020-15701
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-15701
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2020-15701

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2020-15701/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.