CVE-2026-85649 Auth bypass in software-actualizer
An installer script fails to validate password hash generation, potentially creating system images with empty root passwords and allowing unauthorized access.
- Exploited in the wild
- Not known
- Login needed
- An administrator
- Attackable
- Local or same network only
- Victim action needed
- Not needed
- Fix
- None listed
What is CVE-2026-85649?
CVE-2026-85649 is a high-severity authentication bypass vulnerability in chewkeanho software-actualizer, published on 4 Sep 2026. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.
Official description
(Holloway) Chew, Kean Ho's Actualizer v1.2.0 and earlier contains a fail-open password validation vulnerability in the Alpha user and root user password loops of Shell/debian-minbase-install.sh. The installer invokes mkpasswd to generate yescrypt password hashes but does not check the command's return value and unconditionally accepts the result. If mkpasswd fails to generate a yescrypt hash, for example because an incompatible mkpasswd implementation or an environment without yescrypt support is used, the resulting password hash variable can be empty and the build proceeds. The resulting image can therefore contain empty password fields for the root and alpha accounts, potentially permitting passwordless authentication depending on the authentication configuration.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-85649?
How do I fix CVE-2026-85649?
No fix has been published for CVE-2026-85649 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.
Upgrade, and rotate credentials and sessions that may have been exposed. More about Authentication bypass.
Is CVE-2026-85649 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-85649 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Public exploit code: 1 proofs of concept on GitHub.