CVE-2021-4034
Published: 25 January 2022
A local privilege escalation vulnerability was found on polkit's pkexec utility. The pkexec application is a setuid tool designed to allow unprivileged users to run commands as privileged users according predefined policies. The current version of pkexec doesn't handle the calling parameters count correctly and ends trying to execute environment variables as commands. An attacker can leverage this by crafting environment variables in such a way it'll induce pkexec to execute arbitrary code. When successfully executed the attack can cause a local privilege escalation given unprivileged users administrative rights on the target machine.
Priority
Status
| Package | Release | Status |
|---|---|---|
|
policykit-1 Launchpad, Ubuntu, Debian |
bionic |
Released
(0.105-20ubuntu0.18.04.6)
|
| focal |
Released
(0.105-26ubuntu1.2)
|
|
| hirsute |
Ignored
(end of life)
|
|
| impish |
Released
(0.105-31ubuntu0.1)
|
|
| jammy |
Released
(0.105-31ubuntu1)
|
|
| trusty |
Released
(0.105-4ubuntu3.14.04.6+esm1)
Available with Ubuntu Pro or Ubuntu Pro (Infra-only) |
|
| upstream |
Needs triage
|
|
| xenial |
Released
(0.105-14.1ubuntu0.5+esm1)
Available with Ubuntu Pro or Ubuntu Pro (Infra-only) |
Severity score breakdown
| Parameter | Value |
|---|---|
| Base score | 7.8 |
| Attack vector | Local |
| Attack complexity | Low |
| Privileges required | Low |
| User interaction | None |
| Scope | Unchanged |
| Confidentiality | High |
| Integrity impact | High |
| Availability impact | High |
| Vector | CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H |