# CVE-2009-1894: Race condition in n/a

> Local attackers can exploit a race condition in PulseAudio to gain elevated privileges via hard link manipulation.

- **Severity:** High 7.2 (`AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Any signed-in user
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 17 Jul 2009
- **Updated:** 7 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2009-1894, DSA-1838-1, GHSA-8qwr-xcgg-6rcv

## What is CVE-2009-1894?

CVE-2009-1894 is a high-severity vulnerability in n/a, published on 17 Jul 2009. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

Race condition in PulseAudio 0.9.9, 0.9.10, and 0.9.14 allows local users to gain privileges via vectors involving creation of a hard link, related to the application setting LD_BIND_NOW to 1, and then calling execv on the target of the /proc/self/exe symlink.

Weakness: CWE-362 (Concurrent Execution using Shared Resource with Improper Synchronization)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2009-1894?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Pulseaudio Pulseaudio.

## How do I fix CVE-2009-1894?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2009-1894 being exploited?

It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2009-1894 exists.

Public exploit code:

- PulseAudio setuid - Local Privilege Escalation (exploitdb)
- PulseAudio setuid (Ubuntu 9.04 / Slackware 12.2.0) - Local Privilege Escalation (exploitdb)

## Other vulnerabilities in n/a

- [CVE-2007-1804](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2007-1804/): Denial of service in n/a (high 7.8)
- [CVE-2008-0008](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2008-0008/): Privilege escalation in n/a (high 7.2)
- [CVE-2009-1299](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2009-1299/): Path traversal in n/a (medium 6.9)
- [CVE-2024-11586](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-11586/): Denial of service in Ubuntu's pulseaudio (medium 4.0)
- [CVE-2014-3970](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2014-3970/): Denial of service in n/a (low 2.9)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2009-1894 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2009-1894 is a high-severity vulnerability in n/a, published on 17 Jul 2009. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2009-1894 exists.

Affected product: n/a. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2009-1894/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2009-1894/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2009-1894
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2009-1894
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2009-1894

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2009-1894/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.