Vulnerability · Published Feb 25, 2026 · Assigned by GitHub_M

CVE-2026-27976Zed Extension Sandbox Escape via Tar Symlink Following

High 8.8

In plain English

A high-severity security flaw in zed from zed-industries. Proof-of-concept exploit code is public. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 0.7% (higher than 53% of all known vulnerabilities).

Severity (CVSS 3.1)8.8High

Exploit odds (30 days)0.7%top 47.0% of all CVEs

Exploited in the wildNo reportsCISA SSVC: poc

Attack toolingNoneno public tooling known

Official description

Zed, a code editor, has an extension installer allows tar/gzip downloads. Prior to version 0.224.4, the tar extractor (`async_tar::Archive::unpack`) creates symlinks from the archive without validation, and the path guard (`writeable_path_from_extension`) only performs lexical prefix checks without resolving symlinks. An attacker can ship a tar that first creates a symlink inside the extension workdir pointing outside (e.g., `escape -> /`), then writes files through the symlink, causing writes to arbitrary host paths. This escapes the extension sandbox and enables code execution. Version 0.224.4 patches the issue.

Affected products (as reported)

Vendor	Product	Versions
zed-industries	zed	< 0.224.4

Weakness: CWE-61 · Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

References

https://github.com/zed-industries/zed/security/advisories/GHSA-59p4-3mhm-qm3r x_refsource_CONFIRM