Skip to main content
No exploitation reportedFix available

CVE-2018-18385

No exploitation reported by the sources we read.

  • Published2018-10-16
  • Fixed in1.5.8
  • WeaknessCWE-835

Am I affected?

With a domain, we read the version its public headers and pages expose. A distribution build can carry the fix under an older number.

Description

Asciidoctor in versions < 1.5.8 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (infinite loop). The loop was caused by the fact that Parser.next_block was not exhausting all the lines in the reader as the while loop expected it would. This was happening because the regular expression that detects any list was not agreeing with the regular expression that detects a specific list type. So the line kept getting pushed back onto the reader, hence causing the loop.

Timeline

dates in UTC
  1. 2018-10-1616:50CVE publishedNVD

Versions per branch

NVD · OSV
Asciidoctor
BranchAffectedFixed in
1.5< 1.5.81.5.8

as publishedRanges as NVD and OSV publish them; a distribution’s build can be fixed under an older number.

Distribution builds and vendor advisories

Packages from OSV.dev and products from the vendors' CSAF advisories.

version not verifiedVersions not verified: read as OSV.dev and the vendors publish them, not checked against each vendor's release list.

Packages

  • asciidoctorUbuntu:18.04:LTSall versions · no fixed version listed
  • asciidoctorUbuntu:16.04:LTSall versions · no fixed version listed
  • asciidoctorDebian:14all versions · fixed in 1.5.8-1
  • asciidoctorDebian:13all versions · fixed in 1.5.8-1
  • asciidoctorDebian:12all versions · fixed in 1.5.8-1

Vendor advisories

  • CVE-2018-18385 Red Hat Product Security1 known affected

    rubygem-asciidoctor: Infinite loop in the #next_block method

    rubygem-asciidoctor as a component of Red Hat Virtualization 4

Full record on NVD

Fix

  1. Update Asciidoctor to 1.5.8
  2. No fix planned, says the vendor Red Hat Product Security CVE-2018-18385 · 1 productWill not fix

Detection

Nuclei template
none so far
ProjectDiscovery
Exploit-DB
no entry
Exploit-DB
Proof of concept
Metasploit modules
none listed
Metasploit Framework

Sources

Identifiers

Technical details

CVSS v3 Vector
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Published
2018-10-16
Last Modified
2026-06-17
NVD status
Modified
GitHub Advisory
GHSA-qc9p-mjxm-j2wj

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2018-18385?

Asciidoctor in versions < 1.5.8 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (infinite loop). The loop was caused by the fact that Parser.next_block was not exhausting all the lines in the reader as the while loop expected it would. This was happening because the regular expression that detects any list was not agreeing with the regular expression that detects a specific list type. So the line kept getting pushed back onto the reader, hence causing the loop.

Is CVE-2018-18385 actively exploited?

Active exploitation of CVE-2018-18385 has not been confirmed. Its EPSS score was 2.3% on 2026-11-08, the estimated probability of exploitation in the next 30 days.

What is the CVSS score for CVE-2018-18385?

CVE-2018-18385 has a CVSS v3 base score of 7.5 (HIGH severity), with vector string CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H.

Running asciidoctor? Hear about its next vulnerability

Surveillance reads the versions in your stack — a domain, a lockfile or a list — checks each CVE against the ranges its sources publish, and alerts you when one you run is exploited or enters CISA KEV. A version it cannot read stays « version not verified ».

Get alerts for this productCISA KEV additions, November 2026Search CVEs

No credit card required · No monthly cap on website lookups · 250 API requests/month

Go further

Related vulnerabilities

Same product first, then the same vendor advisory and the same publication week.

Back to CVE Database

Sources for this record