CVE intelligence and bounded remediation

CVE-2018-20817 — Activision Call Of Duty: Advanced Warfare security vulnerability

Critical CVSS 9.8

SV_SteamAuthClient in various Activision Infinity Ward Call of Duty games before 2015-08-11 is missing a size check when reading authBlob data into a buffer, which allows one to execute code on the remote target machine when sending a steam authentication request. This affects Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Call of Duty: Ghosts, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, Call of Duty: Black Ops 1, and Call of Duty: Black Ops 2.

Severity
Critical
CVSS
9.8 (3.0)
Published
2019-04-19
CISA KEV
Not currently listed
Ecosystem
software/application
Weaknesses
CWE-119

Affected products

  • activision / call_of_duty:_advanced_warfare
  • activision / call_of_duty:_black_ops_1
  • activision / call_of_duty:_blacks_ops_2
  • activision / call_of_duty:_ghosts
  • activision / call_of_duty:_modern_warfare_2
  • activision / call_of_duty:_modern_warfare_3

Matched remediation archetype

Buffer bounds, memory safety, and memory corruption

This catalog composition supplies bounded fallback guidance. Explicitly reviewed curated workflows load with the complete record below.

Check exposure

  • Identify affected native-code versions, build flags, architectures, parsers, codecs, drivers, and input paths in all shipped artifacts.
  • Determine whether untrusted data reaches the affected routine and the process privilege, sandbox, and network exposure.
  • Confirm statically linked, vendored, firmware, and platform-provided copies, not only package-manager records.

Remediate safely

  • Apply the maintained upstream correction or replace the affected component, then rebuild every dependent artifact from clean inputs.
  • Adopt bounds-checked interfaces, validated sizes and integer conversions, clear ownership, and memory-safe components where practical.
  • Enable supported compiler and runtime hardening and add sanitized tests and fuzz regression seeds derived from non-weaponized fixtures.

Authoritative sources

Complete CVE record and remediation plan

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