Vulnerability · Published Apr 22, 2026 · Assigned by canonical
CVE-2026-35338uutils coreutils chmod Path Traversal Bypass of --preserve-root
High 7.3
In plain English
A high-severity path traversal 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 0.2% (higher than 7% of all known vulnerabilities). Fixed versions are available - upgrade the affected package.
Official description
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.
Affected packages & fixed versions
| Ecosystem | Package | Fixed in | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|
| Debian:12 | rust-coreutils | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-35338 |
| Debian:13 | rust-coreutils | no fix listed | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-35338 |
| Debian:14 | rust-coreutils | 0.6.0-1 | DEBIAN-CVE-2026-35338 |
| Ubuntu:24.04:LTS | rust-coreutils | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-35338 |
| Ubuntu:25.10 | rust-coreutils | no fix listed | UBUNTU-CVE-2026-35338 |
Affected products (as reported)
Weakness: CWE-22 · Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
References
- https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/pull/10033 patch, issue-tracking
- https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/releases/tag/0.6.0 vendor-advisory