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KdeOperating system

CVE-2000-0393

HIGH · 7.2 CVSS v2.0 Published 2000-05-16
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
77/100
Remediation priority · High
No privileges Zero-click

Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.

NVD · unedited
The KDE kscd program does not drop privileges when executing a program specified in a user's SHELL environmental variable, which allows the user to gain privileges by specifying an alternate program to execute.

Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.

dbcve analysis · high confidence

The KDE kscd (KDE CD player) program fails to drop privileges before executing a program specified in the user's SHELL environment variable. An attacker can set SHELL to point to a malicious executable, causing kscd to run it with elevated (root) privileges when the program attempts to invoke a shell.

MitigationUpgrade to a patched version of KDE that properly drops privileges before executing external programs, or remove the kscd binary and set a fixed/trusted SHELL environment variable for all users.

Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.

Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.

NVD · CPE data
KdeOperating system
Affected:= 1.1= 1.1.1= 1.2= 2.0_beta

CVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.

From the vector
Attack vector
Local
Complexity
Low
Authentication
None
Confidentiality
Complete
Integrity
Complete
Availability
Complete

AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C

Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.

dbcve checks

Work through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.

  1. Locate kscd binary
    Run 'which kscd' or check for the binary in common paths such as /usr/bin/kscd, /usr/local/bin/kscd, or /opt/kde/bin/kscd
    Affected if kscd binary exists on the system
  2. Check KDE version
    Run 'kde-config --version' or check your package manager for installed kdebase or kdemultimedia packages
    Affected if KDE version is 1.1, 1.1.1, 1.2, or 2.0_beta
  3. Verify kscd runs as root
    Start kscd and check the process owner with 'ps aux | grep kscd' or run 'kscd' and observe if it executes with root privileges
    Affected if kscd runs with root or elevated privileges (EUID of 0)
  4. Inspect SHELL environment variable
    Run 'echo $SHELL' to see the current value of the SHELL environment variable
    Affected if SHELL points to a non-standard or user-controlled executable path rather than a standard system shell like /bin/bash or /bin/sh

User is affected if kscd is installed, runs with root privileges, and the SHELL environment variable can be controlled to point to an arbitrary executable.

Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.

Check your environment

Paste your version and any relevant configuration and it will be compared against the affected criteria above. Do not include secrets or credentials.

AI-assisted, checked against the advisory. Informational, not a guarantee.

Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.

From vendor data
Mitigation available No clean upgrade yet — mitigate in the meantime
Mitigation

Upgrade to a patched version of KDE that properly drops privileges before executing external programs, or remove the kscd binary and set a fixed/trusted SHELL environment variable for all users.

Fix this in Kde Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation2.0 h
  • Testing1.0 h
  • Review / QA1.0 h
6.0 hours of engineering $1,090
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Scan for this in your stack

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References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.

Primary sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2000-0393 in production — separate from our analysis above.

No notes yet

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What this is

A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.

What belongs here
  • Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
  • No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
  • No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data