nfsd in the Linux kernel before 2.6.28.9 does not drop the CAP_MKNOD capability before handling a user request in a thread, which allows local users to create device nodes, as demonstrated on a filesystem that has been exported with the root_squash option.

cronic before 3 allows local users to write to arbitrary files via a symlink attack on a (1) cronic.out.$$, (2) cronic.err.$$, or (3) cronic.trace.$$ file in /tmp.

atop: symlink attack possible due to insecure tempfile handling

In tesseract 2.03 and 2.04, an attacker can rewrite an arbitrary user file by guessing the PID and creating a link to the user's file.

guilt 0.27 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on a guilt.log.[PID] temporary file.

ocrodjvu 0.4.6-1 on Debian GNU/Linux allows local users to modify arbitrary files via a symlink attack on temporary files that are generated when Cuneiform is invoked as the OCR engine.

The postfix.postinst script in the Debian GNU/Linux and Ubuntu postfix 2.5.5 package grants the postfix user write access to /var/spool/postfix/pid, which might allow local users to conduct symlink attacks that overwrite arbitrary files.

Xfig, possibly 3.2.5, allows local users to read and write arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the (1) xfig-eps[PID], (2) xfig-pic[PID].pix, (3) xfig-pic[PID].err, (4) xfig-pcx[PID].pix, (5) xfig-xfigrc[PID], (6) xfig[PID], (7) xfig-print[PID], (8) xfig-export[PID].err, (9) xfig-batch[PID], (10) xfig-exp[PID], or (11) xfig-spell.[PID] temporary files, where [PID] is a process ID.

Inappropriate implementation in Google Updater in Google Chrome on Windows prior to 94.0.4606.54 allowed a remote attacker to perform local privilege escalation via a crafted file.

dpkg-source in dpkg before 1.14.31 and 1.15.x allows user-assisted remote attackers to modify arbitrary files via a symlink attack on unspecified files in the .pc directory.

In Archive_Tar before 1.4.14, symlinks can refer to targets outside of the extracted archive, a different vulnerability than CVE-2020-36193.

Cool Projects TarDiff allows local users to write to arbitrary files via a symlink attack on a pathname in a /tmp/tardiff-$$ temporary directory.

The pg_ctlcluster script in postgresql-common package in Debian wheezy before 134wheezy5, in Debian jessie before 165+deb8u2, in Debian unstable before 178, in Ubuntu 12.04 LTS before 129ubuntu1.2, in Ubuntu 14.04 LTS before 154ubuntu1.1, in Ubuntu 16.04 LTS before 173ubuntu0.1, in Ubuntu 17.04 before 179ubuntu0.1, and in Ubuntu 17.10 before 184ubuntu1.1 allows local users to gain root privileges via a symlink attack on a logfile in /var/log/postgresql.

RARLAB UnRAR before 6.12 on Linux and UNIX allows directory traversal to write to files during an extract (aka unpack) operation, as demonstrated by creating a ~/.ssh/authorized_keys file. NOTE: WinRAR and Android RAR are unaffected.

The changelog command in Apt before 1.0.9.2 allows local users to write to arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the changelog file.

os-prober in os-prober 1.17 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the (1) /tmp/mounted-map or (2) /tmp/raided-map temporary file. NOTE: the vendor disputes this issue, stating "the insecure code path should only ever run inside a d-i environment, which has no non-root users.

In Perl through 5.26.2, the Archive::Tar module allows remote attackers to bypass a directory-traversal protection mechanism, and overwrite arbitrary files, via an archive file containing a symlink and a regular file with the same name.

trend-autoupdate.new in mailscanner 4.55.10 and other versions before 4.74.16-1 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on a (1) /tmp/opr.ini.##### or (2) /tmp/lpt*.zip temporary file.

qemu-make-debian-root in qemu 0.9.1-5 on Debian GNU/Linux allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on temporary files and directories.

gccross in dpkg-cross 2.3.0 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the tmp/gccross2.log temporary file. NOTE: the vendor disputes this vulnerability, stating that "There is no sense in this bug - the script ... is called under specific cross-building environments within a chroot.

maps/Info/combine.pl in CrossFire crossfire-maps 1.11.0 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on a temporary file.

/bin/login in shadow 4.0.18.1 in Debian GNU/Linux, and probably other Linux distributions, allows local users in the utmp group to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on a temporary file referenced in a line (aka ut_line) field in a utmp entry.

init in initramfs-tools 0.92f allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the /tmp/initramfs.debug temporary file. NOTE: the vendor disputes this vulnerability, stating that "init is [used in] a single-user context; there's no possibility that this is exploitable.

avahi-daemon-check-dns.sh in the Debian avahi package through 0.8-4 is executed as root via /etc/network/if-up.d/avahi-daemon, and allows a local attacker to cause a denial of service or create arbitrary empty files via a symlink attack on files under /run/avahi-daemon. NOTE: this only affects the packaging for Debian GNU/Linux (used indirectly by SUSE), not the upstream Avahi product.

Mumble before 1.3.4 allows remote code execution if a victim navigates to a crafted URL on a server list and clicks on the Open Webpage text.

A certain Debian patch to the run scripts for sabre (aka xsabre) 0.2.4b allows local users to delete or overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on unspecified .tmp files.

The to-upgrade plugin in feta 1.4.16 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink on the (1) /tmp/feta.install.$USER and (2) /tmp/feta.avail.$USER temporary files.

kwallet-pam in KDE KWallet before 5.12.6 allows local users to obtain ownership of arbitrary files via a symlink attack.

A flaw was found in RPC request using gfs3_symlink_req in glusterfs server which allows symlink destinations to point to file paths outside of the gluster volume. An authenticated attacker could use this flaw to create arbitrary symlinks pointing anywhere on the server and execute arbitrary code on glusterfs server nodes.

It was found that the fix for CVE-2018-10927, CVE-2018-10928, CVE-2018-10929, CVE-2018-10930, and CVE-2018-10926 was incomplete. A remote, authenticated attacker could use one of these flaws to execute arbitrary code, create arbitrary files, or cause denial of service on glusterfs server nodes via symlinks to relative paths.

migrate_aliases.sh in Citadel Server 7.37 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on a temporary file.

test.sh in Honeyd 1.5c might allow local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on a temporary file.

ltpmenu in ltp 20060918 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on a /tmp/runltp.mainmenu.##### temporary file.

fr-archive-libarchive.c in GNOME file-roller through 3.36.1 allows Directory Traversal during extraction because it lacks a check of whether a file's parent is a symlink to a directory outside of the intended extraction location.

An issue was discovered in Cinnamon 1.9.2 through 3.8.6. The cinnamon-settings-users.py GUI runs as root and allows configuration of (for example) other users' icon files in _on_face_browse_menuitem_activated and _on_face_menuitem_activated. These icon files are written to the respective user's $HOME/.face location. If an unprivileged user prepares a symlink pointing to an arbitrary location, then this location will be overwritten with the icon content.

axiom-test.sh in axiom 20100701-1.1 uses tempfile to create a safe temporary file but appends a suffix to the original filename and writes to this new filename, which allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the new filename.

(1) debian/postrm and (2) debian/localepurge.config in localepurge before 0.7.3.2 use tempfile to create a safe temporary file but appends a suffix to the original filename and writes to this new filename, which allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the new filename.

syncevo/installcheck-local.sh in syncevolution before 1.3.99.7 uses mktemp to create a safe temporary file but appends a suffix to the original filename and writes to this new filename, which allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on the new filename.

rubyzip gem rubyzip version 1.2.1 and earlier contains a Directory Traversal vulnerability in Zip::File component that can result in write arbitrary files to the filesystem. This attack appear to be exploitable via If a site allows uploading of .zip files , an attacker can upload a malicious file that contains symlinks or files with absolute pathnames "../" to write arbitrary files to the filesystem..

In the cron package through 3.0pl1-128 on Debian, and through 3.0pl1-128ubuntu2 on Ubuntu, the postinst maintainer script allows for group-crontab-to-root privilege escalation via symlink attacks against unsafe usage of the chown and chmod programs.

htpasswd and htdigest in Apache 2.0a9, 1.3.14, and others allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack.

MySQL before 5.0.67 allows local users to bypass certain privilege checks by calling CREATE TABLE on a MyISAM table with modified (1) DATA DIRECTORY or (2) INDEX DIRECTORY arguments that are originally associated with pathnames without symlinks, and that can point to tables created at a future time at which a pathname is modified to contain a symlink to a subdirectory of the MySQL home data directory. NOTE: this vulnerability exists because of an incomplete fix for CVE-2008-4097.

Puppet before 3.3.3 and 3.4 before 3.4.1 and Puppet Enterprise (PE) before 2.8.4 and 3.1 before 3.1.1 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on unspecified files.

Git is an open-source distributed revision control system. In affected versions of Git a specially crafted repository that contains symbolic links as well as files using a clean/smudge filter such as Git LFS, may cause just-checked out script to be executed while cloning onto a case-insensitive file system such as NTFS, HFS+ or APFS (i.e. the default file systems on Windows and macOS). Note that clean/smudge filters have to be configured for that. Git for Windows configures Git LFS by default, and is therefore vulnerable. The problem has been patched in the versions published on Tuesday, March 9th, 2021. As a workaound, if symbolic link support is disabled in Git (e.g. via `git config --global core.symlinks false`), the described attack won't work. Likewise, if no clean/smudge filters such as Git LFS are configured globally (i.e. _before_ cloning), the attack is foiled. As always, it is best to avoid cloning repositories from untrusted sources. The earliest impacted version is 2.14.2. The fix versions are: 2.30.1, 2.29.3, 2.28.1, 2.27.1, 2.26.3, 2.25.5, 2.24.4, 2.23.4, 2.22.5, 2.21.4, 2.20.5, 2.19.6, 2.18.5, 2.17.62.17.6.

NLnet Labs Unbound, up to and including version 1.12.0, and NLnet Labs NSD, up to and including version 4.3.3, contain a local vulnerability that would allow for a local symlink attack. When writing the PID file, Unbound and NSD create the file if it is not there, or open an existing file for writing. In case the file was already present, they would follow symlinks if the file happened to be a symlink instead of a regular file. An additional chown of the file would then take place after it was written, making the user Unbound/NSD is supposed to run as the new owner of the file. If an attacker has local access to the user Unbound/NSD runs as, she could create a symlink in place of the PID file pointing to a file that she would like to erase. If then Unbound/NSD is killed and the PID file is not cleared, upon restarting with root privileges, Unbound/NSD will rewrite any file pointed at by the symlink. This is a local vulnerability that could create a Denial of Service of the system Unbound/NSD is running on. It requires an attacker having access to the limited permission user Unbound/NSD runs as and point through the symlink to a critical file on the system.

Perl module Data::UUID from CPAN version 1.219 vulnerable to symlink attacks