CVE-2017-18078 Privilege escalation in n/a

What is CVE-2017-18078?

CVE-2017-18078 is a high-severity vulnerability in Debian Debian Linux, published on 29 Jan 2018. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

Official description

systemd-tmpfiles in systemd before 237 attempts to support ownership/permission changes on hardlinked files even if the fs.protected_hardlinks sysctl is turned off, which allows local users to bypass intended access restrictions via vectors involving a hard link to a file for which the user lacks write access, as demonstrated by changing the ownership of the /etc/passwd file.

Weakness: CWE-59

Which versions are affected by CVE-2017-18078?

It affects 3 products.

Products include Debian Debian Linux, Opensuse Leap, Systemd Project Systemd.

How do I fix CVE-2017-18078?

Upgrade to a fixed version.

Is CVE-2017-18078 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2017-18078 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Public exploit code: 1 Exploit-DB entry.

Other vulnerabilities in Debian Debian Linux

• CVE-2015-3306 ProFTPD Improper Access Control Exploited Critical 10.0
• CVE-2025-49113 RoundCube Webmail Deserialization of Untrusted Data Exploited Critical 9.9
• CVE-2026-24061 GNU InetUtils Argument Injection Exploited Critical 9.8
• CVE-2025-39682 Linux Kernel Improper Check for Unusual or Exceptional Conditions Exploited Critical 9.8
• CVE-2024-9680 Mozilla Firefox Use-After-Free Exploited Critical 9.8

All Debian Debian Linux vulnerabilities

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2017-18078, GHSA-g2wx-phqf-j84q, SUSE-SU-2018:0546-1, UBUNTU-CVE-2017-18078.