CVE-2026-4946 NSA Ghidra Auto-Analysis Annotation Command Execution
Attackers can execute arbitrary commands on an analyst's machine by crafting a binary with malicious auto-analysis annotations that trigger when clicked in the UI.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- Not needed
- Attackable
- Over the internet
- Victim action needed
- A user has to click or open something
- Fix
- None listed
What is CVE-2026-4946?
CVE-2026-4946 is a high-severity command injection vulnerability in NSA Ghidra, published on 29 Mar 2026. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, and only if a user opens a file or follows a link.
Official description
Ghidra versions prior to 12.0.3 improperly process annotation directives embedded in automatically extracted binary data, resulting in arbitrary command execution when an analyst interacts with the UI. Specifically, the @execute annotation (which is intended for trusted, user-authored comments) is also parsed in comments generated during auto-analysis (such as CFStrings in Mach-O binaries). This allows a crafted binary to present seemingly benign clickable text which, when clicked, executes attacker-controlled commands on the analyst’s machine.
Weakness: CWE-78
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-4946?
It affects 1 product.
Products include Nsa Ghidra.
How do I fix CVE-2026-4946?
No fix has been published for CVE-2026-4946 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.
Upgrade, and pass arguments to programs as a list instead of through a shell. More about Command injection.
Is CVE-2026-4946 being exploited?
It is not confirmed as exploited in the wild, but public exploit code for CVE-2026-4946 exists.
Other vulnerabilities in NSA Ghidra
- CVE-2023-22671 Command injection in n/a
- CVE-2019-16941 XML external entity in n/a
- CVE-2019-13625 XML external entity in n/a
- CVE-2026-49498 Ghidra 11.0 < 12.1 - SQL Injection in PostgreSQL Password Change via Unescaped Username
- CVE-2026-52754 Ghidra < 12.1 - Authentication Bypass via Null Signature in PKIAuthenticationModule
Sources
Also known as GHSA-3wfw-pwxc-r3x9, GHSA-mc3p-mq2p-xw6v.