CVE-2012-1988

Puppet 2.6.x before 2.6.15 and 2.7.x before 2.7.13, and Puppet Enterprise (PE) Users 1.0, 1.1, 1.2.x, 2.0.x, and 2.5.x before 2.5.1 allows remote authenticated users with agent SSL keys and file-creation permissions on the puppet master to execute arbitrary commands by creating a file whose full pathname contains shell metacharacters, then performing a filebucket request.

Published: 2012-05-29 Last update: 2026-06-16 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]

Conclusion & alert: CVE-2012-1988 is rated Moderate Risk (55.4/100): CVSS Medium severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 2.63%). Core evidence: EPSS rose +2.14% over the last day, indicating growing attacker interest. Mandatory action: Review affected assets and schedule remediation.

Risk is dynamic; we continuously reassess and refresh what is shown on this page as upstream context changes.

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2012-1988

EPSS lead: Daily EPSS estimates relative likelihood of exploitation; percentile ranks this CVE among scored vulnerabilities (higher = more severe relative rank).

# Date Old EPSS score New EPSS score Delta (New - Old)
1 2026-06-15 0.49% 2.63% +2.14%
2 2025-06-05 0.43% 0.49% +0.06%
3 2025-03-30 0.43%

Full EPSS history (9 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2012-1988

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
6.0 2.0 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:M/Au:S/C:P/I:P/A:P Click to expand
Access vector (AV:N)
Can be exploited remotely over network reachability.
Access complexity (AC:M)
Exploitation needs some favorable conditions, but not exceptional ones.
Authentication (AU:S)
A single authentication is required.
Confidentiality impact (C:P)
Partial confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:P)
Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:P)
Partial availability impact.
6.8 6.4 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2012-1988

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2012-1988

GHSA-6xxq-j39w-g3f6 · Severity: medium · Ecosystem: rubygems — Puppet Arbitrary Command Execution

OS Trackers for CVE-2012-1988

vendor priority summary link
debian not yet assigned CVE-2012-1988 not yet assigned priority: Debian including 1 source packages (puppet), 1 status rows across 1 suites (bullseye): resolved 1. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2012-1988
gentoo high CVE-2012-1988: 1 GLSA(s) (201208-02), 1 atom(s) (app-admin/puppet); latest impact high. https://bugs.gentoo.org/buglist.cgi?quicksearch=CVE-2012-1988
redhat medium https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2012-1988
ubuntu medium CVE-2012-1988 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (puppet), 6 status rows across 6 suites (hardy, lucid, maverick, natty, oneiric, upstream): released 3, ignored 2, needs-triage 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2012-1988

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2012-1988

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
puppet puppet >= 2.6.0, < 2.6.15 cpe:2.3:a:puppet:puppet:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
puppet puppet >= 2.7.0, < 2.7.13 cpe:2.3:a:puppet:puppet:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
puppet puppet_enterprise >= 1.2.0, < 2.5.1 cpe:2.3:a:puppet:puppet_enterprise:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
puppet puppet_enterprise 1.0 cpe:2.3:a:puppet:puppet_enterprise:1.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
puppet puppet_enterprise 1.1 cpe:2.3:a:puppet:puppet_enterprise:1.1:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 15 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:15:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 16 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:16:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 17 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:17:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
debian debian_linux 6.0 cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:6.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
debian debian_linux 7.0 cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:7.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 10.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:10.04:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 11.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:11.04:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 11.10 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:11.10:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2012-1988

URL Tags
http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2012-April/079227.html Mailing List Third Party Advisory
http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2012-April/079289.html Mailing List Third Party Advisory
http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/package-announce/2012-May/080003.html Mailing List Third Party Advisory
http://projects.puppetlabs.com/issues/13518 Broken Link Vendor Advisory
http://projects.puppetlabs.com/projects/1/wiki/Release_Notes#2.6.15 Broken Link
http://puppetlabs.com/security/cve/cve-2012-1988/ Broken Link Vendor Advisory
http://secunia.com/advisories/48743 Broken Link Vendor Advisory
http://secunia.com/advisories/48748 Broken Link Vendor Advisory
http://secunia.com/advisories/48789 Broken Link Vendor Advisory
http://secunia.com/advisories/49136 Broken Link Vendor Advisory
http://ubuntu.com/usn/usn-1419-1 Third Party Advisory
http://www.debian.org/security/2012/dsa-2451 Third Party Advisory
http://www.osvdb.org/81309 Broken Link
http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/52975 Broken Link Third Party Advisory VDB Entry
https://exchange.xforce.ibmcloud.com/vulnerabilities/74796 Third Party Advisory VDB Entry
https://hermes.opensuse.org/messages/14523305 Broken Link
https://hermes.opensuse.org/messages/15087408 Broken Link
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