CVE-2026-19624 NetworkManager-l2tp: local privilege escalation via ipsec.conf injection
Local attackers can escalate privileges to root by injecting commands into ipsec.conf via malicious L2TP VPN profiles in NetworkManager-l2tp.
- 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
What is CVE-2026-19624?
CVE-2026-19624 is a high-severity command injection vulnerability in Fedora Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux (EPEL), published on 14 Sep 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Official description
A flaw was found in NetworkManager-l2tp. The plugin writes attacker-controlled VPN connection properties (vpn.data and vpn.secrets values) unescaped into a generated ipsec.conf file that pluto loads as root. A local unprivileged user can create and activate their own L2TP VPN profile containing a newline-injected leftupdown directive; pluto executes that command as root when the IKE security association is established, resulting in local privilege escalation. This is the same bug class as CVE-2018-10900 (NetworkManager-vpnc).
Weakness: CWE-88
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-19624?
How do I fix CVE-2026-19624?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Upgrade, and pass arguments to programs as a list instead of through a shell. More about Command injection.
Is CVE-2026-19624 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-19624 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2026-19624, GHSA-4533-c5f5-j3h9, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-19624.