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Midnight CommanderApplication

CVE-2003-1023

HIGH · 7.5 CVSS v2.0 Published 2004-01-20
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
84/100
Remediation priority · High
Remotely reachable 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
Stack-based buffer overflow in vfs_s_resolve_symlink of vfs/direntry.c for Midnight Commander (mc) 4.6.0 and earlier, and possibly later versions, allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code during symlink conversion.

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 · moderate confidence

Stack-based buffer overflow in the vfs_s_resolve_symlink function in vfs/direntry.c of Midnight Commander 4.6.0 and earlier allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via a specially crafted symlink during conversion operations.

MitigationUpdate Midnight Commander to a version newer than 4.6.0. If immediate patching is not possible, restrict or sanitize untrusted symlinks and limit exposure to remote/network sources that could supply malicious symlinks.

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
Midnight CommanderApplication
Affected:= 4.5.52= 4.5.55= 4.6

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
Network
Complexity
Low
Authentication
None
Confidentiality
Partial
Integrity
Partial
Availability
Partial

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

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. Verify Midnight Commander is installed
    Run 'mc --version' or 'rpm -q mc' (RHEL) / 'dpkg -l mc' (Debian) to check if Midnight Commander is present on the system
    Affected if Midnight Commander is installed and the version is 4.5.52, 4.5.55, 4.6, or any version 4.6.0 or earlier
  2. Confirm the installed version number
    Compare the version output from 'mc --version' against the affected range: 4.5.52, 4.5.55, 4.6, or earlier than 4.6.0
    Affected if The installed version matches exactly 4.5.52, 4.5.55, or 4.6, or is any version 4.6.0 and earlier
  3. Check if VFS (Virtual File System) module is in use
    Inspect whether Midnight Commander's VFS functionality is being accessed - this includes operations like directory browsing, file copying, or any conversion operations that process symlinks in the vfs/direntry.c module
    Affected if VFS operations that involve symlink resolution (particularly conversion operations) are performed on untrusted directory sources
  4. Identify exposure to untrusted symlinks
    Review logs or system usage for instances where Midnight Commander processes symlinks from remote/network sources, FTP servers, or untrusted local directories
    Affected if The environment involves processing symlinks from sources that could contain maliciously crafted symlinks (especially from network or remote sources)

You are affected if Midnight Commander version 4.6.0 or earlier (specifically 4.5.52, 4.5.55, or 4.6) is installed AND the VFS module is used to process symlinks from potentially untrusted sources.

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

Update Midnight Commander to a version newer than 4.6.0. If immediate patching is not possible, restrict or sanitize untrusted symlinks and limit exposure to remote/network sources that could supply malicious symlinks.

Fix this in Midnight Commander Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation4.0 h
  • Testing3.0 h
  • Review / QA2.0 h
11.0 hours of engineering $1,930
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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-2003-1023 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
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