CVE-2026-79655
HIGH 7.8 PoC AVAILABLEA flaw was found in sos clean, a utility within the sos package. This vulnerability allows a local attacker to perform arbitrary file creation or overwrite. By crafting a malicious tar archive, an attacker can exploit a path traversal issue during tar extraction, where symlink and hardlink targets are not properly validated. This enables the attacker to write files to arbitrary locations on the system with the privileges of the sos clean process, which often runs as root.
Public exploit or PoC code exists. Modeled probability is still low, but the barrier to attack is reduced — watch closely.
Exploitation likelihood
0.1%chance of exploitation in 30 days · 4th percentile
Impact if exploited
7.8CVSS 3.1 · HIGH
- ConfidentialityHigh
- IntegrityHigh
- AvailabilityHigh
What an attacker needs
- ⚠Access: Requires local access to the host
- ✓Privileges: No account or privileges required
- ⚠User interaction: A user must take an action (click / open a file)
- ✓Complexity: No special conditions — reliably repeatable
✓ lowers the bar for an attacker · ⚠ raises it
Proof of concept & exploit code
- reference https://github.com/sosreport/sos/issues/4460
- github-search Search GitHub for public PoC repos
Test against your own equipment
curl -s https://vulnpedia.com/cve/CVE-2026-79655/poc.jsonMachine-readable PoC index for this CVE (for automation).Listed for defensive triage, patch verification, and authorized testing on systems you own. Machine-readable: /cve/CVE-2026-79655/poc.json
Affected
Vendors Red Hat
Products Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9
Weakness (CWE)
- CWE-59: Improper Link Resolution Before File Access ('Link Following')
CVSS vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
All CVSS metrics
- HIGH 7.8 v3.1 · CNA Primary
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H - HIGH 7.8 v3.1 · NVD Primary
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H