CVE-2014-6278

HIGH

8.8

CVSS Score

Published: September 30, 2014 at 10:00 AM UTC

Updated: June 17, 2026 at 12:12 AM UTC

1 product affected across 1 vendorBash

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Severity

HIGH8.8

Exploitation

CISA KEV

Exploit prediction

EPSS 100%

SSVC

Active

Actively Exploited

CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) Catalog

EPSS Score99.7%

EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) estimates a 99.7% chance this CVE is exploited in the wild within the next 30 days — higher than 100% of all CVEs. It complements CVSS: a high EPSS on a mid-severity CVE can still be urgent.

GNU Bash contains an OS command injection vulnerability which allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary commands via a crafted environment.

Required Action

Apply mitigations per vendor instructions, follow applicable BOD 22-01 guidance for cloud services, or discontinue use of the product if mitigations are unavailable.

Ransomware Use

Unknown

Added to KEV

Oct 2, 2025

Remediation Due

Oct 23, 2025

368 days overdue

Notes

This vulnerability could affect an open-source component, third-party library, protocol, or proprietary implementation that could be used by different products. For more information, please see: http://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/bash/bash-4.3-patches/bash43-027

https://support.broadcom.com/web/ecx/support-content-notification/-/external/content/SecurityAdvisories/0/23467

https://sec.cloudapps.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-20140926-bash

https://www.ibm.com/support/pages/security-bulletin-update-vulnerabilities-bash-affect-aix-toolbox-linux-applications-cve-2014-6271-cve-2014-6277-cve-2014-6278-cve-2014-7169-cve-2014-7186-and-cve-2014-7187

https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2014-6278

Description

GNU Bash through 4.3 bash43-026 does not properly parse function definitions in the values of environment variables, which allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary commands via a crafted environment, as demonstrated by vectors involving the ForceCommand feature in OpenSSH sshd, the mod_cgi and mod_cgid modules in the Apache HTTP Server, scripts executed by unspecified DHCP clients, and other situations in which setting the environment occurs across a privilege boundary from Bash execution. NOTE: this vulnerability exists because of an incomplete fix for CVE-2014-6271, CVE-2014-7169, and CVE-2014-6277.