CVE-2016-7925 Tcpdump CVE debrief

Who should care

Security teams, Linux distribution maintainers, and operators who use tcpdump 4.8.1 or earlier should prioritize this. It is especially relevant wherever tcpdump is used to inspect packet captures or network data as part of normal operations.

Technical summary

NVD describes the flaw as a buffer overflow in the compressed SLIP parser within tcpdump’s print-sl.c:sl_if_print() routine. The affected range is tcpdump versions before 4.9.0, with NVD’s CPE criteria marking versions through 4.8.1 as vulnerable. The weakness is classified as CWE-119.

Defensive priority

Critical. The CVSS vector is CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H, so this should be treated as an urgent upgrade item for any exposed or broadly deployed tcpdump installation.

Recommended defensive actions

• Upgrade tcpdump to 4.9.0 or later, or install the vendor-maintained fixed package for your distribution.
• Inventory systems running tcpdump 4.8.1 or earlier and confirm remediation status.
• Review Debian, Red Hat, and Gentoo advisory pages linked from the CVE record to align with your distribution’s fix path.
• Avoid relying on outdated tcpdump binaries for analyzing untrusted capture data until patched.
• Validate that security baselines and package management policies prevent reinstallation of vulnerable tcpdump versions.

Evidence notes

This debrief is based on the NVD CVE record and the CVE description stating a compressed SLIP parser buffer overflow in tcpdump before 4.9.0. NVD lists the vulnerable CPE as tcpdump versions through 4.8.1 and assigns CVSS 3.0 9.8 with CWE-119. The linked Debian, Red Hat, and Gentoo advisories support the remediation context.

Official resources