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Root Privilege Escalation | XPC path Parameter
CVE ID
CVE-2018-7716
VENDOR
PrivateVPN
PRODUCT
PrivateVPN
Product version
< 2.0.31
Vulnerability Details
PrivateVPN for MacOS suffers from a root privilege escalation vulnerability with its com.privat.vpn.helper
privileged helper tool. This privileged helper tool implements an XPC service that allows arbitrary installed applications to connect and send messages. The XPC service extracts the path string from the corresponding XPC message. This string is supposed to point to the PrivateVPN's internal openvpn binary. If a new connection has not already been established, an attacker can send the XPC service a malicious XPC message with the path string pointing at a binary that he or she controls. This results in execution of arbitrary code as the root user.
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Vendor response
Vendor will release update.
Disclosure timeline
02-21-2018 - Vendor disclosure 02-21-2018 - Vendor response 02-21-2018 - VerSprite responsed to vendor with instructions for resolving vulnerabilies in vendor software. 02-23-2018 - Vendor released update 02-23-2018 - Vendor response and follow up 02-24-2018 - Vendor submitted update 02-26-2018 - VerSprite confirmed vulnerability remains. 02-26-2018 - Vendor disclosure and followup 03-05-2018 - Vendor notified of advisory release