CVE intelligence and bounded remediation

CVE-2019-14873 — Newlib Project Newlib security vulnerability

Medium CVSS 6.5

In the __multadd function of the newlib libc library, prior to versions 3.3.0 (see newlib/libc/stdlib/mprec.c), Balloc is used to allocate a big integer, however no check is performed to verify if the allocation succeeded or not. This will trigger a null pointer dereference bug in case of a memory allocation failure.

Severity
Medium
CVSS
6.5 (3.1)
Published
2020-03-19
CISA KEV
Not currently listed
Ecosystem
software/application
Weaknesses
CWE-476

Affected products

  • newlib_project / newlib

Matched remediation archetype

Buffer bounds, memory safety, and memory corruption

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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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