CVE-2026-96281 Flatpak: flatpak: unprivileged active user can bypass anti-downgrade checks for system apps/runtimes
A local user can bypass anti-downgrade protections to install vulnerable older versions of system-wide Flatpak applications.
- 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
What is CVE-2026-96281?
CVE-2026-96281 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10, published on 27 Sep 2026. 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
On a multi-user system, a user with an active local login session could downgrade a system-wide Flatpak app to an older version by removing the app's remote ref via the unprivileged system-helper RemoveLocalRef method, causing the anti-downgrade check to fail to find a reference date. A malicious local user could use this to expose other users of the same system to an app version with unfixed vulnerabilities.
Weakness: CWE-284
Which versions are affected by CVE-2026-96281?
How do I fix CVE-2026-96281?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Is CVE-2026-96281 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2026-96281 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2026-96281, UBUNTU-CVE-2026-96281.