# CVE-2023-28142: Race Condition

> A race condition in Qualys Cloud Agent for Windows allows local attackers to escalate privileges to SYSTEM during uninstallation.

- **Severity:** Medium 6.7 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:R/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:** A user has to click or open something
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 18 Apr 2023
- **Updated:** 3 Mar 2025
- **Also known as:** GHSA-7m47-393h-xm3q

## What is CVE-2023-28142?

CVE-2023-28142 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Qualys Cloud Agent, published on 18 Apr 2023. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.

### Official description

A Race Condition exists in the Qualys Cloud Agent for Windows
platform in versions from 3.1.3.34 and before 4.5.3.1. This allows attackers to
escalate privileges limited on the local machine during uninstallation of the
Qualys Cloud Agent for Windows. Attackers may gain SYSTEM level privileges on
that asset to run arbitrary commands.

At the time of this disclosure, versions before 4.0 are classified as End
of Life.

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

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2023-28142?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Qualys Cloud Agent.

## How do I fix CVE-2023-28142?

No fix has been published for CVE-2023-28142 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2023-28142 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-28142 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Qualys Cloud Agent

- [CVE-2023-28140](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-28140/): Executable Hijacking (medium 6.7)
- [CVE-2023-28141](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-28141/): NTFS Junction (medium 6.7)
- [CVE-2023-28143](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-28143/): Local Privilege Escalation (medium 6.7)
- [CVE-2022-29550](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-29550/): Information disclosure in n/a (medium 5.5)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2023-28142 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2023-28142 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Qualys Cloud Agent, published on 18 Apr 2023. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-28142 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Qualys Cloud Agent. 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-2023-28142/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-28142/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2023-28142
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-28142
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2023-28142

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-28142/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.