CVE-2017-15271
A use-after-free issue could be triggered remotely in the SFTP component of PSFTPd 10.0.4 Build 729.
Does this matter?
A public exploit is published in Exploit-DB, so the technical barrier is gone even though the severity is medium and EPSS is 8.7%. Treat it as high on anything reachable from the internet.
Description
A use-after-free issue could be triggered remotely in the SFTP component of PSFTPd 10.0.4 Build 729. This issue could be triggered prior to authentication. The PSFTPd server did not automatically restart, which enabled attackers to perform a very effective DoS attack against this service. By sending a crafted SSH identification / version string to the server, a NULL pointer dereference could be caused, apparently because of a race condition in the window message handling, performing the cleanup for invalid connections. This incorrect cleanup code has a use-after-free.
- CVSS 3.0
- 5.9 MEDIUMCVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
- EPSS
- 8.74% probability · 95th percentile
- Public exploits
- 1 in Exploit-DB · first 14 November 2017
- CISA KEV
- Not listed
- Weakness
- CWE-416
- Affected
- psftp/psftpd
- Source
- cve@mitre.org
EPSS moved from 6.9% on 21 September 2026 to 8.7% on 27 October 2026. The dashed line is the ten per cent mark our analysts treat as “patch before the next change window”.
Public exploits (1)
Entries in Exploit-DB that cite this CVE. Links go to the Exploit-DB page and to the file in the public repository; nothing is hosted here. A verified tick means the Exploit-DB team confirmed the exploit works against the stated version.
References
- http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/144972/PSFTPd-Windows-FTP-Server-10.0.4-Build-729-Use-After-Free-Log-Injection.htmlThird Party Advisory, VDB Entry
- http://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/541518/100/0/threaded
- https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/43144/Third Party Advisory, VDB Entry
- https://www.x41-dsec.de/lab/advisories/x41-2017-006-psftpd/Third Party Advisory
- http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/144972/PSFTPd-Windows-FTP-Server-10.0.4-Build-729-Use-After-Free-Log-Injection.htmlThird Party Advisory, VDB Entry
- http://www.securityfocus.com/archive/1/541518/100/0/threaded
- https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/43144/Third Party Advisory, VDB Entry
- https://www.x41-dsec.de/lab/advisories/x41-2017-006-psftpd/Third Party Advisory
Source: NVD record, EPSS from FIRST.org, KEV from CISA, exploits from Exploit-DB. Refreshed daily. Download this record as JSON.