CVE-2026-43941 | Unvalidated shell.openExternal in electerm allows arbitrary protocol execution via terminal link click

electerm is an open-sourced terminal/ssh/sftp/telnet/serialport/RDP/VNC/Spice/ftp client. In versions 3.8.15 and prior, Electerm's terminal hyperlink handler passes any URL clicked in the terminal directly to shell.openExternal without any protocol validation. An attacker who controls terminal output (e.g., via a malicious SSH server, compromised remote host, or malicious plugin rendering terminal content) can thus achieve arbitrary code execution or local file access on the victim's machine, requiring only that the victim clicks a displayed link. At time of publication, there are no publicly available patches.

Published: 2026-05-08 Last update: 2026-05-08 Assigner: [email protected] Source: [email protected]
NVD Status：Analyzed，CVE State: published
View at NVD, CVE.org, EUVD

CVE-2026-43941 is rated Moderate Risk (40.5/100): CVSS Critical severity, with low exploitation likelihood (EPSS 0.02%). 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-2026-43941

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 2026-05-22 0.05% 0.02% -0.03%
2 2026-05-08 — 0.05% —

Full EPSS history (2 records total)

Common vulnerability scoring system (CVSS) metrics for CVE-2026-43941

CVSS metrics for this CVE.

Base score Version Severity Vector Exploitability Impact Score source
9.6 3.1 CRITICAL
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H Click to expand
Attack vector (AV:N)
Could be attacked over the internet or any normal routed network—not just someone sitting at the machine.
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:N)
No account or special rights needed—anonymous or random user is enough.
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.
 2.8 6.0 [email protected]

Weakness enumeration for CVE-2026-43941

GitHub Security Advisory for CVE-2026-43941

GHSA-fwf6-j56g-m97c · Severity: high · Ecosystem: npm — Electerm has an unvalidated shell.openExternal that allows arbitrary protocol execution via terminal link click

Affected software / configurations for CVE-2026-43941

Vendor Product Version Raw CPE
electerm_project electerm <= 3.8.15 cpe:2.3:a:electerm_project:electerm:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*

References for CVE-2026-43941

cvelogic Threat Intelligence