CVE-2020-11651

Exp

An issue was discovered in SaltStack Salt before 2019.2.4 and 3000 before 3000.2. The salt-master process ClearFuncs class does not properly validate method calls. This allows a remote user to access some methods without authentication. These methods can be used to retrieve user tokens from the salt master and/or run arbitrary commands on salt minions.

Published: 2020-04-30 Last update: 2026-06-16 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Analyzed，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2020-11651 is rated Critical Active Threat (100/100): CVSS Critical severity, with high exploitation likelihood (EPSS 96.41%, 100th percentile). CISA KEV confirms active exploitation (added 2021-11-03) affecting SaltStack / Salt. Unauthenticated remote administrative access may be possible. EPSS rose +2.17% over the last day, indicating growing attacker interest. The CISA remediation deadline has passed—treat as an emergency patch priority.

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

CISA KEV Record for CVE-2020-11651

Name: SaltStack Salt Authentication Bypass Vulnerability · CISA KEV detail

Exploit added: 2021-11-03

Action due: 2022-05-03

Required action: Apply updates per vendor instructions.

Public exploit references (Exploit-DB) for CVE-2020-11651

EDB-ID Source Kind Published Link
48421 exploit_db edb 2020-05-05 Exploit-DB ↗
— nvd_ref exploit_tag Exploit-DB ↗
— nvd_ref exploit_tag Exploit-DB ↗

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2020-11651

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 94.24% 96.41% +2.17%
2 2026-04-19 94.42% 94.24% -0.18%
3 2025-11-21 — 94.42% —

Full EPSS history (9 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2020-11651

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
9.8 3.1 CRITICAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:H)
Serious risk that confidential data gets exposed in a big way.
Integrity (I:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 3.9 5.9 [email protected]
9.8 3.1 CRITICAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
Attack complexity (AC:L)
Once they can reach the bug, pulling it off is straightforward—no weird race conditions or rare setup.
Privileges required (PR:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
User interaction (UI:N)
Nobody has to click “OK” or open a trap file; it can work without a victim helping.
Scope (S:U)
Damage stays in the same “trust bubble” as the broken component—no big spill into unrelated systems.
Confidentiality (C:H)
Serious risk that confidential data gets exposed in a big way.
Integrity (I:H)
They could widely tamper with or forge data—trust in the data is badly hurt.
Availability (A:H)
Could take the service down hard or make it unusable for people who depend on it.
 3.9 5.9 134c704f-9b21-4f2e-91b3-4a467353bcc0
7.5 2.0 HIGH
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P Click to expand
Access vector (AV:N)
Can be exploited remotely over network reachability.
Access complexity (AC:L)
Exploitation conditions are straightforward and predictable.
Authentication (AU:N)
No authentication is required.
Confidentiality impact (C:P)
Partial confidentiality impact.
Integrity impact (I:P)
Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:P)
Partial availability impact.
 10.0 6.4 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2020-11651

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2020-11651

GHSA-pjhf-vpx3-33r3 · Severity: critical · Ecosystem: pip — SaltStack Salt Unauthenticated Remote Code Execution

OS Trackers for CVE-2020-11651

vendor priority summary link
alpine — CVE-2020-11651: 1 source package rows (salt); 9 state rows across 7 repos (3.17-community, 3.18-community, 3.19-community, 3.20-community, 3.21-community, 3.22-community, edge-community); fixed 7, open 2. https://security.alpinelinux.org/vuln/CVE-2020-11651
redhat high — https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-11651
suse critical CVE-2020-11651 severity critical: SUSE including 408 source package names (1.4.2:python3-distro-1.5.0-3.5.1, 2.5.3-61.1:python3-distro-1.5.0-3.5.1, …), 870 product×package rows across 244 product lines (Container caasp/v4/389-ds, Container suse/389-ds, … (244 product lines)): Fixed 634, Known Affected 231, Known Not Affected 5. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-11651/
ubuntu medium CVE-2020-11651 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (salt), 11 status rows across 11 suites (bionic, eoan, focal, jammy, kinetic, lunar, mantic, noble, trusty, upstream, xenial): DNE 4, released 4, not-affected 2, ignored 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2020-11651

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2020-11651

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
saltstack salt < 2019.2.4 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 3000, < 3000.2 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
opensuse leap 15.1 cpe:2.3:o:opensuse:leap:15.1:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
debian debian_linux 8.0 cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:8.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
debian debian_linux 9.0 cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:9.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
debian debian_linux 10.0 cpe:2.3:o:debian:debian_linux:10.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 16.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:16.04:*:*:*:esm:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 18.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:18.04:*:*:*:lts:*:*:*
vmware application_remote_collector 7.5.0 cpe:2.3:a:vmware:application_remote_collector:7.5.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
vmware application_remote_collector 8.0.0 cpe:2.3:a:vmware:application_remote_collector:8.0.0:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2020-11651

URL Tags
http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2020-04/msg00047.html Mailing List Third Party Advisory
http://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-security-announce/2020-07/msg00070.html Mailing List Third Party Advisory
http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/157560/Saltstack-3000.1-Remote-Code-Execution.html Exploit Third Party Advisory VDB Entry
http://packetstormsecurity.com/files/157678/SaltStack-Salt-Master-Minion-Unauthenticated-Remote-Code-Execution.html Exploit Third Party Advisory VDB Entry
http://www.vmware.com/security/advisories/VMSA-2020-0009.html Third Party Advisory
https://docs.saltstack.com/en/latest/topics/releases/2019.2.4.html Vendor Advisory
https://github.com/saltstack/salt/blob/v3000.2_docs/doc/topics/releases/3000.2.rst Third Party Advisory
https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2020/05/msg00027.html Mailing List Third Party Advisory
https://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-salt-2vx545AG Third Party Advisory
https://usn.ubuntu.com/4459-1/ Third Party Advisory
https://www.debian.org/security/2020/dsa-4676 Third Party Advisory
https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog?field_cve=CVE-2020-11651 US Government Resource
cvelogic Threat Intelligence