CVE-2023-43090 | Gnome-shell: screenshot tool allows viewing open windows when session is locked

Exp

A vulnerability was found in GNOME Shell. GNOME Shell's lock screen allows an unauthenticated local user to view windows of the locked desktop session by using keyboard shortcuts to unlock the restricted functionality of the screenshot tool.

Published: 2023-09-22 Last update: 2024-11-21 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Modified，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2023-43090 is rated Exploit Available (50/100): CVSS Medium severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.31%). 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-2023-43090

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

Exploit prediction scoring system (EPSS) score for CVE-2023-43090

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 0.09% 0.31% +0.22%
2 2025-08-31 0.05% 0.09% +0.05%
3 2025-04-15 — 0.05% —

Full EPSS history (11 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2023-43090

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]
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]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2023-43090

OS Trackers for CVE-2023-43090

vendor priority summary link
alpine — CVE-2023-43090: 1 source package rows (gnome-shell); 1 state rows across 1 repos (3.18-community); fixed 0, open 1. https://security.alpinelinux.org/vuln/CVE-2023-43090
debian unimportant CVE-2023-43090 unimportant priority: Debian including 1 source packages (gnome-shell), 5 status rows across 5 suites (bookworm, bullseye, forky, sid, trixie): resolved 5. https://security-tracker.debian.org/tracker/CVE-2023-43090
redhat medium — https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2023-43090
suse medium CVE-2023-43090 severity moderate: SUSE including 24 source package names (gnome-extensions, gnome-extensions-45.0-2.1, …), 112 product×package rows across 39 product lines (SUSE CaaS Platform 4.0, SUSE Enterprise Storage 7.1, … (39 product lines)): Known Not Affected 89, Fixed 23. https://www.suse.com/security/cve/CVE-2023-43090/
ubuntu medium CVE-2023-43090 medium priority: Ubuntu including 1 source packages (gnome-shell), 8 status rows across 8 suites (bionic, focal, jammy, lunar, mantic, trusty, upstream, xenial): not-affected 4, released 3, ignored 1. https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2023-43090

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2023-43090

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
gnome gnome-shell >= 43, < 43.9 cpe:2.3:a:gnome:gnome-shell:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
gnome gnome-shell >= 44, < 44.5 cpe:2.3:a:gnome:gnome-shell:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
gnome gnome-shell 42 cpe:2.3:a:gnome:gnome-shell:42:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 37 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:37:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
fedoraproject fedora 38 cpe:2.3:o:fedoraproject:fedora:38:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2023-43090

cvelogic Threat Intelligence