CVE-2023-42125 | Avast Premium Security Sandbox Protection Link Following Privilege Escalation Vulnerability

Avast Premium Security Sandbox Protection Link Following Privilege Escalation Vulnerability. This vulnerability allows local attackers to escalate privileges on affected installations of Avast Premium Security. An attacker must first obtain the ability to execute low-privileged code on the target system in order to exploit this vulnerability. The specific flaw exists within the implementation of the sandbox feature. By creating a symbolic link, an attacker can abuse the service to create arbitrary namespace objects. An attacker can leverage this vulnerability to escalate privileges and execute arbitrary code in the context of SYSTEM. . Was ZDI-CAN-20383.

Published: 2024-05-03 Last update: 2025-08-13 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Analyzed，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2023-42125 is rated Moderate Risk (41.6/100): CVSS High severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.11%). 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-2023-42125

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 2025-11-21 0.05% 0.11% +0.06%
2 2025-11-18 0.09% 0.05% -0.04%
3 2025-04-15 — 0.09% —

Full EPSS history (5 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2023-42125

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
7.8 3.0 HIGH
CVSS:3.0/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-2023-42125

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2023-42125

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
avast premium_security 22.12.6044 cpe:2.3:a:avast:premium_security:22.12.6044:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2023-42125

cvelogic Threat Intelligence