CVE-2021-31607

Exp

In SaltStack Salt 2016.9 through 3002.6, a command injection vulnerability exists in the snapper module that allows for local privilege escalation on a minion. The attack requires that a file is created with a pathname that is backed up by snapper, and that the master calls the snapper.diff function (which executes popen unsafely).

Published: 2021-04-23 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2021-31607 is rated High Exploit Risk (76.5/100): CVSS High severity, with medium exploitation likelihood (EPSS 3.81%). 1 public exploit reference(s) are indexed (Exploit-DB). Public exploits are available—assess exposure, apply mitigations, and prioritize patching.

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

Public exploit references (Exploit-DB) for CVE-2021-31607

EDB-ID Source Kind Published Link
— nvd_ref exploit_tag Exploit-DB ↗

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2021-31607

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 4.55% 3.81% -0.74%
2 2025-11-21 6.07% 4.55% -1.52%
3 2025-11-18 — 6.07% —

Full EPSS history (24 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2021-31607

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
7.8 3.1 HIGH
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H 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: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.
 1.8 5.9 [email protected]
4.6 2.0 MEDIUM
AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P 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:P)
Partial integrity impact.
Availability impact (A:P)
Partial availability impact.
 3.9 6.4 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2021-31607

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2021-31607

GHSA-hcjf-rp5h-g5h3 · Severity: high · Ecosystem: pip — Command Injection in SaltStack Salt

OS Trackers for CVE-2021-31607

vendor priority summary link
alpine — CVE-2021-31607: 1 source package rows (salt); 13 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 6. https://security.alpinelinux.org/vuln/CVE-2021-31607
gentoo high CVE-2021-31607: 1 GLSA(s) (202310-22), 1 atom(s) (app-admin/salt); latest impact high. https://bugs.gentoo.org/buglist.cgi?quicksearch=CVE-2021-31607
redhat medium — https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2021-31607
suse high CVE-2021-31607 severity important: SUSE including 504 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, …), 1076 product×package rows across 242 product lines (Container caasp/v4/389-ds, Container suse/389-ds, … (242 product lines)): Fixed 843, Known Affected 231, Known Not Affected 2. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2021-31607/
ubuntu medium CVE-2021-31607 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, not-affected 3, needed 1, released 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2021-31607

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2021-31607

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
saltstack salt >= 2016.9, <= 3002.6 cpe:2.3:a:saltstack:salt:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 33 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:33:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 34 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:34:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 35 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:35:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2021-31607

URL Tags
https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2021/11/msg00009.html Mailing List Third Party Advisory
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/6BUWUF5VTENNP2ZYZBVFKPSUHLKLUBD5/ Mailing List Third Party Advisory
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/ACVT7M4YLZRLWWQ6SGRK3C6TOF4FXOXT/ Mailing List Third Party Advisory
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/LDKMAJXYFHM4USVX3H5V2GCCBGASWUSM/ Mailing List Third Party Advisory
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/package-announce%40lists.fedoraproject.org/message/MBAHHSGZLEJRCG4DX6J4RBWJAAWH55RQ/ Mailing List Third Party Advisory
https://sec.stealthcopter.com/saltstack-snapper-minion-privledge-escaltion/ Exploit Patch Third Party Advisory
https://security.gentoo.org/glsa/202310-22 Third Party Advisory
https://www.debian.org/security/2021/dsa-5011 Third Party Advisory
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