#VU23780 Permissions, Privileges, and Access Controls in shadow - CVE-2019-19882
Published: December 20, 2019 / Updated: January 29, 2020
Vulnerability identifier: #VU23780
Vulnerability risk: Low
CVSSv4.0: CVSS:4.0/AV:L/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:U/U:Clear
CVE-ID: CVE-2019-19882
CWE-ID: CWE-264
Exploitation vector: Local access
Exploit availability:
No public exploit available
Vulnerable software:
shadow
shadow
Software vendor:
Mark Florian
Mark Florian
Description
The vulnerability allows a local user to escalate privileges on the system.
The vulnerability exists due to missconfigured setuid programs in shadow 4.8 when compiled using --with-libpam but without explicitly passing --disable-account-tools-setuid, and without a PAM configuration suitable for use with setuid account management tools.. A local unprivileged user can leverage groupadd, groupdel, groupmod, useradd, userdel, or usermod management tools to escalate privileges on the system to root.
The issue affects at least Gentoo, Arch Linux, and Void Linux.
Remediation
Install update from vendor's website.