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Slashem TtyApplication · FreeBSD

CVE-2003-1474

HIGH · 7.2 CVSS v2.0 Published 2003-12-31
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
slashem-tty in the FreeBSD Ports Collection is installed with write permissions for the games group, which allows local users with group games privileges to modify slashem-tty and execute arbitrary code as other users, as demonstrated using a separate vulnerability in LTris.

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 slashem-tty binary in FreeBSD Ports Collection is installed with group-writable permissions for the 'games' group, allowing any local user with games group membership to modify the binary and execute arbitrary code with the privileges of users who subsequently run it.

MitigationChange the file permissions on slashem-tty to remove group write access (e.g., chmod 755 or chown root:wheel) and audit other ports for similar permission misconfigurations.

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
Slashem TtyApplication
Affected:= 0.0.6e.4f.8

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 the slashem-tty binary
    Run 'which slashem-tty' or 'find /usr/local -name slashem-tty -type f 2>/dev/null' to find the binary's path
    Affected if The binary exists on the system
  2. Check the installed version
    Run 'pkg info slashem-tty' or check the port version in /var/db/pkg
    Affected if The installed version equals 0.0.6e.4f.8
  3. Verify file ownership and group
    Run 'ls -la /path/to/slashem-tty' and check the owner and group columns
    Affected if The file is owned by any user and the group is 'games'
  4. Check for group-writable permissions
    Examine the group permissions in the ls -la output (the middle three characters), looking for 'rw-' in the group field
    Affected if The group permission field shows 'rw-' indicating write access for the games group
  5. Confirm games group membership risk
    Check /etc/group for the games group entry and enumerate users in that group with 'grep ^games /etc/group'
    Affected if Any non-root users are members of the games group

The user is affected if slashem-tty version 0.0.6e.4f.8 is installed AND the binary has group-writable permissions for the games group, allowing games group members to modify it.

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

Change the file permissions on slashem-tty to remove group write access (e.g., chmod 755 or chown root:wheel) and audit other ports for similar permission misconfigurations.

Fix this in Slashem Tty Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation1.0 h
  • Implementation2.0 h
  • Testing1.0 h
  • Review / QA1.0 h
5.0 hours of engineering $890
Get help mitigating

An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $1,424.

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-2003-1474 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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