A vulnerability in the chmod utility of uutils coreutils allows users to bypass the --preserve-root safety mechanism. The implementation only validates if the target path is literally / and does not canonicalize the path. An attacker or accidental user can use path variants such as /../ or symbolic links to execute destructive recursive operations (e.g., chmod -R 000) on the entire root filesystem, leading to system-wide permission loss and potential complete system breakdown.
Fix
Patch, vendor advisory and mitigation references on NVD 1
- https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/pull/10033 Issue Tracking, Patch
Every line above is quoted from NVD, CISA, Microsoft, the vendor's own advisory or DISA; nothing is generated.
Change history 1
- First seenCVSS 7.3 · uutilsNVD modified 2026-10-26 21:10
Affected (CPE criteria) 1
cpe:2.3:a:uutils:coreutils:*:*:*:*:*:rust:*:*
References 2
- https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/pull/10033 Issue Tracking, Patch
- https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/releases/tag/0.6.0 Release Notes