A local privilege escalation vulnerability was found in the ansible.posix authorized_key module. The module's keyfile() function uses os.chown() instead of os.lchown() and opens files without O_NOFOLLOW when managing SSH authorized keys. An unprivileged local user can pre-stage symbolic links in their ~/.ssh directory to redirect file ownership changes to arbitrary system paths when an operator runs the authorized_key task as root, leading to local privilege escalation.
Fix
Nothing published yet: no patch, vendor advisory or mitigation reference on NVD, no vendor advisory in the News for this CVE, not in CISA's KEV, no fixed package version. BaselineWatch does not guess at one.
Public exploits 1
- M8seven/cve-2026-11837-ansible-posix-authorized-key PoC on GitHub
Each line links to the index that lists it, never to exploit code. Exploit-DB's "verified" and a Metasploit rank of good or better count as verified; a PoC-in-GitHub entry is a repository's claim.
Change history 1
- First seenCVSS 7.3NVD modified 2026-10-13 21:17
Affected (CPE criteria) 0
NVD has not attached CPE configurations yet.
References 8
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2026:79112
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2026:80508
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2026:82339
- https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-11837
- https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2487424
- https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2026-11837
- https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2487424
- https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/2026/cve-2026-11837.json