CVE-2023-1326 | local privilege escalation in apport-cli

A privilege escalation attack was found in apport-cli 2.26.0 and earlier which is similar to CVE-2023-26604. If a system is specially configured to allow unprivileged users to run sudo apport-cli, less is configured as the pager, and the terminal size can be set: a local attacker can escalate privilege. It is extremely unlikely that a system administrator would configure sudo to allow unprivileged users to perform this class of exploit.

Published: 2023-04-13 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]

Conclusion & alert: CVE-2023-1326 is rated Moderate Risk (62.9/100): CVSS High severity, with high exploitation likelihood (EPSS 5.49%, 90th percentile). Core evidence: EPSS ranks this CVE among the most likely to be exploited in the near term. Mandatory action: High exploitation likelihood—assess exposure and prioritize 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-2023-1326

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 2026-06-06 5.05% 5.49% +0.44%
2 2026-05-01 4.38% 5.05% +0.66%
3 2026-04-30 4.38%

Full EPSS history (33 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2023-1326

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
7.7 3.1 HIGH
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:R/S:C/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:H)
They need powerful rights—admin, root, or similar—before this pays off.
User interaction (UI:R)
A real person has to do something—click, install, enable—otherwise it doesn’t land.
Scope (S:C)
Breaking this can reach past the original component and bite other resources—bigger blast radius.
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.
1.1 6.0 [email protected]
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]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2023-1326

OS Trackers for CVE-2023-1326

vendor priority summary link
suse medium https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2023-1326/
ubuntu medium CVE-2023-1326 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (apport), 8 status rows across 8 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, kinetic, lunar, trusty, upstream, xenial): released 6, not-affected 2. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2023-1326

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2023-1326

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
canonical apport <= 2.26.0 cpe:2.3:a:canonical:apport:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 18.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:18.04:*:*:*:lts:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 20.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:20.04:*:*:*:lts:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 22.04 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:22.04:*:*:*:lts:*:*:*
canonical ubuntu_linux 22.10 cpe:2.3:o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:22.10:*:*:*:-:*:*:*

References for CVE-2023-1326

cvelogic Threat Intelligence