# CVE-2020-10138: Privilege escalation in Cyber Backup

> Local attackers can achieve SYSTEM privileges by creating a malicious OpenSSL configuration file in a predictable path used by the Acronis privileged service.

- **Severity:** High 7.8 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H`)
- **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:** No
- **Published:** 21 Oct 2020
- **Updated:** 4 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** GHSA-8h9x-6778-m2fg

## What is CVE-2020-10138?

CVE-2020-10138 is a high-severity vulnerability in Acronis Cyber Protect, published on 21 Oct 2020. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

Acronis Cyber Backup 12.5 and Cyber Protect 15 include an OpenSSL component that specifies an OPENSSLDIR variable as a subdirectory within C:\jenkins_agent\. Acronis Cyber Backup and Cyber Protect contain a privileged service that uses this OpenSSL component. Because unprivileged Windows users can create subdirectories off of the system root, a user can create the appropriate path to a specially-crafted openssl.cnf file to achieve arbitrary code execution with SYSTEM privileges.

Weakness: CWE-665 (Improper Initialization), CWE-284 (Improper Access Control)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2020-10138?

It affects 2 products.


Products: Acronis Cyber Backup, Acronis Cyber Protect.

## How do I fix CVE-2020-10138?

No fix has been published for CVE-2020-10138 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2020-10138 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2020-10138 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Acronis Cyber Protect

- [CVE-2022-30995](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-30995/): Information disclosure in Acronis Cyber Backup 12.5 (critical 9.3)
- [CVE-2022-3405](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-3405/): Privilege escalation in Acronis Cyber Backup 12.5 (critical 9.3)
- [CVE-2020-16171](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2020-16171/): Server-side request forgery in n/a (medium 6.5)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2020-10138 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2020-10138 is a high-severity vulnerability in Acronis Cyber Protect, published on 21 Oct 2020. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2020-10138 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Acronis Cyber Protect. 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-2020-10138/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2020-10138/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2020-10138
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2020-10138
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2020-10138

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2020-10138/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.