Root privilege escalation via symlink-following file utilities
Published Jul 20, 2026 · Updated Jul 20, 2026
Privilege escalation in Extreme Networks Switch Engine releases allows remote authenticated users to gain root access through CLI file operations. The EXOS shell's mv, cp, and rm utilities fail to canonicalize paths safely and follow attacker-created symbolic links into privileged filesystem locations. Low-privilege CLI access over the network or serial console is required, enabling security-critical files to be read, modified, or replaced and the device software stack to be persistently altered.
Summary
What happened
Privilege escalation in Extreme Networks Switch Engine releases allows remote authenticated users to gain root access through CLI file operations. The EXOS shell's mv, cp, and rm utilities fail to canonicalize paths safely and follow attacker-created symbolic links into privileged filesystem locations. Low-privilege CLI access over the network or serial console is required, enabling security-critical files to be read, modified, or replaced and the device software stack to be persistently altered.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-8170
- Published
- Jul 20, 2026
- Updated
- Jul 20, 2026
- Vendor
- Extreme Networks
- Product
- Switch Engine
- Classifications
- CWE-59, T1068
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Jul 20, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Jul 20, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
Compare these published version ranges with your installed build and any vendor patches.
- Affected versionversion=0 <31.7.4
- Affected versionversion=32.0.0 <32.7.4.15
- Affected versionversion=33.0.0 <33.1.100
- Affected versionversion=33.2.0 <33.7.1
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
CVSS describes severity. EPSS estimates exploitation probability.
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Weakness, pattern, technique
Public exploit references
No public exploit references are available in this record.
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Technologies
Your stack
See the directory against your own environment.
Your stack
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