Is CVE-2020-17438 actively exploited?

No active exploitation of CVE-2020-17438 has been confirmed so far. Continue monitoring, as exploit status can change.

Can CVE-2020-17438 be exploited remotely?

Yes. CVE-2020-17438 is exploitable remotely over the network (CVSS attack vector: Network).

What is the CVSS score of CVE-2020-17438?

CVE-2020-17438 has a CVSS score of 9.8 (CRITICAL).

HOME VULNERABILITIESCVE-2020-17438

CRITICAL

CVE-2020-17438

CWE-787Published: December 11, 2020· Updated: Jun 17, 2026

9.8

CVSS v3.1

Official Description

An issue was discovered in uIP 1.0, as used in Contiki 3.0 and other products. The code that reassembles fragmented packets fails to properly validate the total length of an incoming packet specified in its IP header, as well as the fragmentation offset value specified in the IP header. By crafting a packet with specific values of the IP header length and the fragmentation offset, attackers can write into the .bss section of the program (past the statically allocated buffer that is used for storing the fragmented data) and cause a denial of service in uip_reass() in uip.c, or possibly execute arbitrary code on some target architectures.

NVD Source

Technical Analysis

CVE-2020-17438 can be exploited remotely over the network without requiring physical or adjacent access, significantly expanding the attack surface for threat actors.

The vulnerability requires no privileges and no user interaction, making it a prime target for automated exploitation campaigns and worm-like propagation.

A successful exploit results in complete confidentiality breach (data exposure), full integrity compromise (data manipulation), availability disruption (denial of service), with a CVSS base score of 9.8.

From a weakness classification perspective (CWE-787): Out-of-bounds write vulnerabilities can lead to data corruption, crashes, or arbitrary code execution.