CVE-2017-6920 — drupal/core
CRITICALCVE-2017-6920 is a critical-severity (CVSS 9.8) CWE-19 vulnerability in drupal/core. EPSS puts its 30-day exploitation probability at 15.6% (97th percentile). A fix is available for drupal/core — see the affected versions and patch details below.
Drupal PECL YAML parser unsafe object handling
EPSS Exploitation Probability
EPSS (Exploit Prediction Scoring System) is a daily probability model maintained by FIRST.org. It estimates the likelihood a CVE will be exploited in production environments within the next 30 days, derived from real-world threat intelligence signals.
How urgent is this, really
CVE-2017-6920 plotted by exploitation likelihood (EPSS) against impact (CVSS). The shaded corner — EPSS 50%+ and CVSS 7.0+ — is where this CVE doesn't sit, though severity or exploitability alone can still warrant action.
Where this sits among everything scored
Of 377,333 CVEs with a current EPSS score, this one falls in the 10–50% band (highlighted). Real counts from FIRST.org, not a sample — log-scaled since the landscape is heavily right-skewed.
Real-World Exposure
drupal/core🐘drupal/drupalReal-time download stats are indexed for npm and PyPI packages. This vulnerability affects Packagist packages — download data is not available via public APIs for these ecosystems.
Description
Drupal core 8 before versions 8.3.4 allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code due to the PECL YAML parser not handling PHP objects safely during certain operations.
Affected Packages
| Ecosystem | Package | Vulnerable range | Fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🐘Packagist | drupal/core | ≥ 8.0&&< 8.3.4 | 8.3.4composer require drupal/core:^8.3.4 |
| 🐘Packagist | drupal/drupal | ≥ 8.0&&< 8.3.4 | 8.3.4composer require drupal/drupal:^8.3.4 |
Detection & mitigation playbook
Open-source dependencyDetect
Scan your dependency tree (package-lock.json, pnpm-lock.yaml, requirements.txt, go.sum, etc.) for drupal/core, including transitive dependencies — a direct dependency you never call can still pull in a vulnerable version.
Fix
Update drupal/core to 8.3.4 or later, then make sure no transitive (indirect) dependency still pins the vulnerable range — O3 confirms CVE-2017-6920 is resolved across your whole dependency graph.
Workarounds
If you can't upgrade right away: gate or disable the affected feature, validate untrusted input at the boundary, and avoid passing attacker-controlled data into the vulnerable path. O3's runtime protection blocks exploitation in production as an interim safeguard until the upgrade lands.
How O3 protects you
O3 Security's impact-aware SCA analyses which vulnerable code paths your application actually calls, so a match like CVE-2017-6920 can be triaged on real exposure rather than presence alone.
Tailored to CVE-2017-6920. Runtime protection reduces exposure until a permanent patch is applied and verified — it complements patching, it doesn't replace it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is CVE-2017-6920 in your dependencies?
O3 Security finds CVE-2017-6920 across Packagist dependencies, including transitive ones, and its impact-aware SCA ranks findings by whether your code actually calls the vulnerable path.