CVE-2008-4475
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 · uneditedibackup 2.27 allows local users to overwrite arbitrary files via a symlink attack on temporary files.
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 confidenceibackup 2.27 contains a symlink attack vulnerability in its temporary file handling. The application creates temporary files in a world-writable location without proper checks, allowing a local attacker to pre-create symlinks pointing to arbitrary files which then get overwritten when ibackup writes to those temporary file paths.
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= 2.27CVSS 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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Check if Gnu Ibackup is installedRun 'which ibackup' or 'dpkg -l | grep ibackup' or 'rpm -qa | grep ibackup' depending on your systemAffected if ibackup is not found on the system, the user is not affected
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Verify the installed ibackup versionRun 'ibackup --version' or 'ibackup -v' to obtain the exact version numberAffected if The installed version is 2.27 exactly, indicating potential vulnerability
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Identify the temporary file directory used by ibackupRun ibackup with strace or ltrace to trace file operations, or inspect the application binary for temporary file path patterns (look for /tmp or /var/tmp in open() calls)Affected if Temporary files are created in a world-writable directory such as /tmp or /var/tmp without sanitization
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Check permissions on the temporary directoryRun 'ls -ld /tmp' or the identified temp directory to verify it is world-writable (should show 'drwxrwxrwx' or similar)Affected if The directory has world-writable permissions (mode 777 or similar), allowing any local user to place symlinks
A user is affected if Gnu Ibackup version 2.27 is installed and it creates temporary files in a world-writable location without checking for or removing pre-existing symlinks.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
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 dataRefactor temporary file creation to use secure methods such as mkstemp() with O_EXCL flag, or create temporary files in a secure directory with restricted permissions (0700) and verify/remove any existing symlinks before writing.
- Consultation3.0 h
- Implementation6.0 h
- Testing3.0 h
- Review / QA2.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $3,984.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2008-4475 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2008-4475 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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- Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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