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AixOperating system · Ibm

CVE-2008-4018

HIGH · 7.2 CVSS v2.0 Published 2008-09-11
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
swcons in bos.rte.console in IBM AIX 5.2.0 through 6.1.1 allows local users in the system group to create or overwrite an arbitrary file, and establish weak permissions and root ownership for this file, via unspecified vectors. NOTE: this can be leveraged to gain privileges. NOTE: this issue exists because of an incomplete fix for CVE-2007-5805.

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

Local privilege escalation vulnerability in IBM AIX's swcons utility (bos.rte.console) allows users in the 'system' group to create or overwrite arbitrary files with root ownership and weak permissions. This stems from an incomplete fix for CVE-2007-5805, enabling privilege escalation to root.

MitigationApply IBM AIX security patches for this vulnerability. Verify that the system group membership is restricted to essential personnel and consider disabling or restricting the swcons utility if not required.

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
AixOperating system
Affected:= 5.2= 5.3= 6.1

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. Identify AIX version
    Run 'oslevel -r' or 'uname -a' to determine the installed AIX version
    Affected if The version is 5.2 (5200), 5.3 (5300), or 6.1 (6100)
  2. Verify bos.rte.console package is installed
    Run 'lslpp -l bos.rte.console' to check if the swcons package is installed
    Affected if The package is installed and the AIX version matches the affected ranges
  3. Identify users in the system group
    Run 'lsgroup system' or 'grep ^system: /etc/group' to list members of the 'system' group
    Affected if Any user account is a member of the 'system' group on an affected AIX version with the vulnerable package installed
  4. Verify swcons binary permissions
    Run 'ls -la /usr/sbin/swcons' to inspect the file permissions and ownership of the swcons binary
    Affected if The binary exists with root ownership and allows write access by system group members

A system is affected if it runs AIX 5.2, 5.3, or 6.1 with the bos.rte.console package installed and has users assigned to the 'system' group.

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

Apply IBM AIX security patches for this vulnerability. Verify that the system group membership is restricted to essential personnel and consider disabling or restricting the swcons utility if not required.

Fix this in Aix Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation4.0 h
  • Implementation8.0 h
  • Testing6.0 h
  • Review / QA4.0 h
22.0 hours of engineering $3,860
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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-2008-4018 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