Vulnerability · Published Apr 22, 2026 · Assigned by canonical
CVE-2026-35376uutils coreutils chcon Security Bypass and Mandatory Access Control (MAC) Inconsistency via TOCTOU Race Condition
Medium 4.5
In plain English
A medium-severity security flaw in coreutils from Uutils. There are no confirmed reports of exploitation so far. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 0.1% (higher than 1% of all known vulnerabilities). Fixed versions are available - upgrade the affected package.
Official description
A Time-of-Check to Time-of-Use (TOCTOU) vulnerability exists in the chcon utility of uutils coreutils during recursive operations. The implementation resolves recursive targets using a fresh path lookup (via fts_accpath) rather than binding the traversal and label application to the specific directory state encountered during traversal. Because these operations are not anchored to file descriptors, a local attacker with write access to a directory tree can exploit timing-sensitive rename or symbolic link races to redirect a privileged recursive relabeling operation to unintended files or directories. This vulnerability breaks the hardening expectations for SELinux administration workflows and can lead to the unauthorized modification of security labels on sensitive system objects.
Affected packages & fixed versions
| Ecosystem | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| Debian:12 | rust-coreutils | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-35376 |
| Debian:13 | rust-coreutils | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-35376 |
| Debian:14 | rust-coreutils | 0.10.0-1 | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-35376 |
| Ubuntu:24.04:LTS | rust-coreutils | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-35376 |
| Ubuntu:25.10 | rust-coreutils | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-35376 |
Affected products (as reported)
Weakness: CWE-367 · Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L
References
- https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/pull/11402 patch, issue-tracking
- https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/releases/tag/0.8.0 vendor-advisory