CVEvulnerability

CVE-2021-4034

7.8 HIGH Known exploited Published 2022-01-28 Modified 2026-08-15 Official page ↗

CISA Known Exploited Vulnerability

Red Hat Polkit Out-of-Bounds Read and Write Vulnerability — Red Hat Polkit

The Red Hat polkit pkexec utility contains an out-of-bounds read and write vulnerability that allows for privilege escalation with administrative rights.

Added to KEV
2022-06-27
Remediation due
2022-07-18
Ransomware use
Known
Required action
Apply updates per vendor instructions.
Notes
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-4034
Status
Analyzed
Published
2022-01-28
Last modified
2026-08-15
Assigner
[email protected]
CVSS 3.1 ([email protected])
7.8 HIGH — CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
CVSS 3.1 (134c704f-9b21-4f2e-91b3-4a467353bcc0)
7.8 HIGH — CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
CVSS 2.0 ([email protected])
7.2 HIGH — AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C
Weaknesses
CWE-125, CWE-787

Description

A local privilege escalation vulnerability was found on polkit's pkexec utility. The pkexec application is a setuid tool designed to allow unprivileged users to run commands as privileged users according predefined policies. The current version of pkexec doesn't handle the calling parameters count correctly and ends trying to execute environment variables as commands. An attacker can leverage this by crafting environment variables in such a way it'll induce pkexec to execute arbitrary code. When successfully executed the attack can cause a local privilege escalation given unprivileged users administrative rights on the target machine.

Affected configurations

• polkit project polkit (< 121) • redhat enterprise linux server update services for sap solutions 7.6 • redhat enterprise linux server update services for sap solutions 7.7 • redhat enterprise linux 8.0 • redhat enterprise linux desktop 7.0 • redhat enterprise linux eus 8.2 • redhat enterprise linux for ibm z systems 7.0 • redhat enterprise linux for ibm z systems 8.0 • redhat enterprise linux for ibm z systems eus 8.2 • redhat enterprise linux for ibm z systems eus 8.4 • redhat enterprise linux for power big endian 7.0 • redhat enterprise linux for power little endian 7.0 • redhat enterprise linux for power little endian 8.0 • redhat enterprise linux for power little endian eus 8.1 • redhat enterprise linux for power little endian eus 8.2 • redhat enterprise linux for power little endian eus 8.4 • redhat enterprise linux for scientific computing 7.0 • redhat enterprise linux server 6.0 • redhat enterprise linux server 7.0 • redhat enterprise linux server aus 7.3 • redhat enterprise linux server aus 7.4 • redhat enterprise linux server aus 7.6 • redhat enterprise linux server aus 7.7 • redhat enterprise linux server aus 8.2 • redhat enterprise linux server aus 8.4 • redhat enterprise linux server eus 8.4 • redhat enterprise linux server tus 7.6 • redhat enterprise linux server tus 7.7 • redhat enterprise linux server tus 8.2 • redhat enterprise linux server tus 8.4 • redhat enterprise linux server update services for sap solutions 8.1 • redhat enterprise linux server update services for sap solutions 8.2 • redhat enterprise linux server update services for sap solutions 8.4 • redhat enterprise linux workstation 7.0 • canonical ubuntu linux 14.04 • canonical ubuntu linux 16.04 • canonical ubuntu linux 18.04 • canonical ubuntu linux 20.04 • canonical ubuntu linux 21.10 • suse enterprise storage 7.0 • suse linux enterprise high performance computing 15.0 • suse manager proxy 4.1 • suse manager server 4.1 • suse linux enterprise desktop 15 • suse linux enterprise server 15 • suse linux enterprise workstation extension 12 • oracle http server 12.2.1.3.0 • oracle http server 12.2.1.4.0 • oracle zfs storage appliance kit 8.8 • siemens sinumerik edge (< 3.3.0) • siemens scalance lpe9403 firmware (< 2.0) • starwindsoftware command center 1.0 • starwindsoftware starwind virtual san v8

Related

Weakness · CWE (2)

  • CWE-125 Out-of-bounds Read weakness
  • CWE-787 Out-of-bounds Write weakness

References