CVE-2020-17490

The TLS module within SaltStack Salt through 3002 creates certificates with weak file permissions.

Published: 2020-11-06 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2020-17490 is rated Low Risk (26.8/100): CVSS Medium severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.05%). Monitor for updates and reassess as exploit intelligence or EPSS changes.

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-2020-17490

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 2026-04-19 0.06% 0.05% -0.01%
2 2025-11-21 0.04% 0.06% +0.02%
3 2025-11-18 — 0.04% —

Full EPSS history (11 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2020-17490

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
5.5 3.1 MEDIUM
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:L)
They already need access on the box, or another person has to do something wrong; it’s not a remote drive-by.
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:L)
A normal user session is enough; they don’t have to be admin.
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:N)
Data isn’t meaningfully altered or forged.
Availability (A:N)
Service keeps running; no real outage angle.
 1.8 3.6 [email protected]
2.1 2.0 LOW
AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N Click to expand
Access vector (AV:L)
Requires local access to the target system.
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:N)
No integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:N)
No availability impact.
 3.9 2.9 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2020-17490

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2020-17490

GHSA-3c56-vx6v-q5vh · Severity: medium · Ecosystem: pip — SaltStack Salt Allows creating certificates with weak file permissions

OS Trackers for CVE-2020-17490

vendor priority summary link
alpine medium CVE-2020-17490: 1 source package rows (salt); 11 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 4. https://security.alpinelinux.org/vuln/CVE-2020-17490
gentoo normal CVE-2020-17490: 1 GLSA(s) (202011-13), 1 atom(s) (app-admin/salt); latest impact normal. https://bugs.gentoo.org/buglist.cgi?quicksearch=CVE-2020-17490
redhat medium — https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-17490
suse medium CVE-2020-17490 severity moderate: SUSE including 245 source package names (bind-formula-0.1.1603299886.60e4bcf-3.3.2, grafana-formula-0.3.0-3.3.2, …), 353 product×package rows across 51 product lines (Image SLES12-SP5-Azure-BYOS, Image SLES12-SP5-Azure-HPC-BYOS, … (51 product lines)): Fixed 352, Known Not Affected 1. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2020-17490/
ubuntu medium CVE-2020-17490 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (salt), 16 status rows across 16 suites (bionic, focal, groovy, hirsute, impish, jammy, kinetic, lunar, mantic, noble, oracular, plucky, questing, trusty, upstream, xenial): DNE 7, ignored 4, released 3, needs-triage 1, not-affected 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2020-17490

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2020-17490

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
saltstack salt < 2015.8.10 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2015.8.11, < 2015.8.13 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2016.3.0, < 2016.3.4 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2016.3.5, < 2016.3.6 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2016.3.7, < 2016.3.8 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2016.11.0, < 2016.11.3 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2016.11.4, < 2016.11.6 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2016.11.7, < 2016.11.10 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2017.5.0, < 2017.7.4 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2017.7.5, < 2017.7.8 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2018.2.0, < 2018.3.5 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 2019.2.0, < 2019.2.5 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt >= 3000.0, < 3000.3 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
saltstack salt 3001 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:3001:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
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:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2020-17490

cvelogic Threat Intelligence