CVE-2014-4427
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 · uneditedApp Sandbox in Apple OS X before 10.10 allows attackers to bypass a sandbox protection mechanism via the accessibility API.
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 confidenceThis vulnerability in Apple OS X versions before 10.10 allows attackers to bypass the App Sandbox protection mechanism by exploiting the accessibility API. The accessibility API, designed for assistive technologies, can be leveraged to escape sandbox restrictions and gain unauthorized access to system resources.
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<= 10.9.5CVSS 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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Check the installed OS X versionOpen Apple menu > About This Mac, or run 'sw_vers' in Terminal, or run 'system_profiler SPSoftwareDataType'Affected if The version displayed is 10.9.5 or earlier (any version before OS X 10.10)
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Verify accessibility API permissionsOpen System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Privacy > Accessibility. Review which applications have accessibility permissions granted.Affected if Any untrusted or third-party applications have accessibility permissions enabled, as this exposes the API that can be used to escape the sandbox
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Identify sandboxed applicationsCheck for applications with App Sandbox enabled using codesign: 'codesign -dvv /path/to/application.app' and look for 'com.apple.security.app-sandbox' entitlementAffected if Applications with App Sandbox enabled are present in the environment, as the vulnerability allows escaping this protection
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Confirm system is not patchedIf available, check for Apple security update 2014-005 or later: 'system_profiler SPInstallHistoryDataType' to see installed updatesAffected if The system shows OS X version 10.9.5 or earlier with no security update 2014-005 installed
A user is affected if they are running OS X 10.9.5 or earlier and have applications with App Sandbox enabled alongside accessibility permissions granted to untrusted applications.
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 dataUpgrade all affected systems to OS X 10.10 (Yosemite) or later, which contains the fix for this sandbox bypass vulnerability. Organizations should also review and restrict accessibility API permissions for untrusted applications.
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation4.0 h
- Testing4.0 h
- Review / QA2.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2014-4427 — 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-2014-4427 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
- No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
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