Total SecurityApplication · Bitdefender

CVE-2018-6183

HIGH · 7.8 CVSS v3.0 Published 2018-03-12
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
80/100
Remediation priority · High
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
BitDefender Total Security 2018 allows local users to gain privileges or cause a denial of service by impersonating all the pipes through a use of an "insecurely created named pipe". Ensures full access to Everyone users group.

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

BitDefender Total Security 2018 creates named pipes with insecure permissions that grant full access to the Everyone group. Local unprivileged users can impersonate these pipes to escalate privileges to SYSTEM level or cause denial of service.

MitigationUpgrade to a current version of BitDefender that has this vulnerability patched. If upgrading is not possible, consider compensating controls such as restricting local user access or deploying an alternative endpoint security solution.

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
Total SecurityApplication
Affected:= 2018

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
Privileges
Low
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
High

CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

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 installed BitDefender version
    Open Control Panel > Programs and Features, or run 'wmic product get name,version' to list installed software and locate BitDefender Total Security
    Affected if Version shown is exactly 2018 (any build)
  2. Locate BitDefender named pipes
    Open an elevated command prompt and run 'tasklist /svc | findstr -i bitdefender' to identify running BitDefender services, then check for named pipes using a tool like Process Explorer or by enumerating \\pipe\* from a non-elevated command prompt
    Affected if BitDefender services are running and named pipes accessible to all users exist
  3. Inspect named pipe permissions
    Use Sysinternals Process Explorer (right-click a BitDefender process > Properties > Security) or icacls on identified pipe objects to view the DACL
    Affected if The DACL grants Full Control or Write to the Everyone group or Authenticated Users on BitDefender pipes
  4. Verify unprivileged pipe access
    From a standard (non-admin) user account, attempt to connect to BitDefender pipes using a tool like pipelist from Sysinternals or custom code to call CreateFile on the pipe
    Affected if Non-admin user can successfully open and write to BitDefender named pipes

If BitDefender Total Security 2018 is installed with running services and its named pipes grant broad access to Everyone or authenticated users, the system is vulnerable to local privilege escalation.

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

Upgrade to a current version of BitDefender that has this vulnerability patched. If upgrading is not possible, consider compensating controls such as restricting local user access or deploying an alternative endpoint security solution.

Fix this in Total Security Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation3.0 h
  • Implementation6.0 h
  • Testing4.0 h
  • Review / QA2.0 h
15.0 hours of engineering $2,640
Get help mitigating

An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $4,224.

Scan for this in your stack

Free · runs locally
dbcve dependency scanner

Check whether your project pulls in CVE-2018-6183 — 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 sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2018-6183 in production — separate from our analysis above.

No notes yet

Be the first to add a field note for this CVE — a mitigation you’ve verified, a version caveat, or a link to a working fix. Sign in above to contribute.

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