CVE-2025-11000VulnerabilityPublished 26 Sep 2025

CVE-2025-11000: Open Babel · NULL Pointer Dereference

Affects Open BabelSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 4.8 Medium.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 06:26 UTC

CVSS 4.0 base score

4.8Medium

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 0.2% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 15% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:L/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:P

Base metrics

Attack Vector: Local
Attack Complexity: Low
Attack Requirements: None
Privileges Required: Low
User Interaction: None
Vulnerable system confidentiality: None
Vulnerable system integrity: None
Vulnerable system availability: Low
Subsequent system confidentiality: None
Subsequent system integrity: None
Subsequent system availability: None

Threat metrics

Exploit Maturity: POC

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Local: The vulnerable system is not bound to the network stack and the attacker’s path is via read/write/execute capabilities. Either the attacker exploits the vulnerability by accessing the target system locally (e.g., keyboard, console), or through terminal emulation (e.g., SSH); or the attacker relies on User Interaction by another person to perform actions required to exploit the vulnerability (e.g., using social engineering techniques to trick a legitimate user into opening a malicious document).
Attack Complexity: Low: The attacker must take no measurable action to exploit the vulnerability. The attack requires no target-specific circumvention to exploit the vulnerability. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable system.
Attack Requirements: None: The successful attack does not depend on the deployment and execution conditions of the vulnerable system. The attacker can expect to be able to reach the vulnerability and execute the exploit under all or most instances of the vulnerability.
Privileges Required: Low: The attacker requires privileges that provide basic capabilities that are typically limited to settings and resources owned by a single low-privileged user. Alternatively, an attacker with Low privileges has the ability to access only non-sensitive resources.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without interaction from any human user, other than the attacker.
Vulnerable system confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the Vulnerable System.
Vulnerable system integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the Vulnerable System.
Vulnerable system availability: Low: Performance is reduced or there are interruptions in resource availability. Even if repeated exploitation of the vulnerability is possible, the attacker does not have the ability to completely deny service to legitimate users. The resources in the Vulnerable System are either partially available all of the time, or fully available only some of the time, but overall there is no direct, serious consequence to the Vulnerable System.
Subsequent system confidentiality: None: There is no loss of confidentiality within the Subsequent System or all confidentiality impact is constrained to the Vulnerable System.
Subsequent system integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the Subsequent System or all integrity impact is constrained to the Vulnerable System.
Subsequent system availability: None: There is no impact to availability within the Subsequent System or all availability impact is constrained to the Vulnerable System.
Exploit Maturity: POC: Based on threat intelligence sources each of the following must apply: · Proof-of-concept is publicly available · No knowledge of reported attempts to exploit this vulnerability · No knowledge of publicly available solutions used to simplify attempts to exploit the vulnerability

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v4.0 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 26 Sep 2025
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 2026-10-26.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
Open Babel	Affected =3.1.0 =3.1.1	Fixed in–

AI-suggested

To mitigate this vulnerability, European organizations should: 1) Upgrade Open Babel to a version later than 3.1.1 once a patched release is available, as this is the most effective remediation. 2) Until patching is possible, restrict local access to systems running Open Babel to trusted users only, minimizing the risk of local exploitation. 3) Implement strict user privilege management to ensure that only authorized personnel have the ability to execute Open Babel or access molecular data processing environments. 4) Monitor system logs and application behavior for unexpected crashes or denial of service symptoms related to Open Babel processes. 5) Where feasible, isolate Open Babel workloads in containerized or sandboxed environments to limit the impact of crashes and prevent potential lateral movement. 6) Educate users and administrators about the vulnerability and the importance of applying updates promptly. 7) Review and harden local security policies to prevent untrusted users from executing arbitrary code or malformed input files that could trigger the vulnerability.

Description

A vulnerability was determined in Open Babel up to 3.1.1. This affects the function PQSFormat::ReadMolecule of the file /src/formats/PQSformat.cpp. This manipulation causes null pointer dereference. The attack is restricted to local execution. The exploit has been publicly disclosed and may be utilized.

Impact

For European organizations, particularly research institutions, pharmaceutical companies, and chemical industry entities that rely on Open Babel for molecular data processing and cheminformatics, this vulnerability could disrupt critical workflows. A local attacker or malicious insider with access to affected systems could trigger application crashes, leading to denial of service conditions that interrupt data analysis, modeling, or automated processing pipelines. While the vulnerability does not allow data exfiltration or system compromise, the interruption of scientific computations could delay research projects, impact data integrity indirectly, and reduce operational efficiency. Organizations with shared computing environments or multi-user systems where Open Babel is installed are at higher risk, as low-privilege users could exploit this flaw to disrupt other users' work. The impact is primarily operational and availability-related rather than confidentiality or integrity. Given the local attack vector, the threat is lower for organizations with strict access controls and limited user privileges but remains relevant for environments with multiple users or less restrictive local access policies.

References

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 26 Sep 2025, 04:00 UTC

Technical details

References

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