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Little SnitchApplication · Obdev

CVE-2019-13013

MEDIUM · 5.5 CVSS v3.1 Published 2019-08-23
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to after 4.3.2 or later.
See remediation →
57/100
Remediation priority · Elevated
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
Little Snitch versions 4.3.0 to 4.3.2 have a local privilege escalation vulnerability in their privileged helper tool. The privileged helper tool implements an XPC interface which is available to any process and allows directory listings and copying files as root.

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

Little Snitch versions 4.3.0 to 4.3.2 contain a local privilege escalation vulnerability in their privileged helper tool. The helper implements an XPC interface that is accessible to any process on the system and allows unprivileged users to perform directory listings and copy files with root-level privileges.

MitigationUpdate Little Snitch to a version newer than 4.3.2, or disable/remove the privileged helper tool 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
Little SnitchApplication
Affected:>= 4.3.0, <= 4.3.2

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
None
Availability
None

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N

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 Little Snitch installed version
    Open Little Snitch and go to About Little Snitch, or run: defaults read /Applications/Little\ Snitch.app/Contents/Info CFBundleShortVersionString
    Affected if The version is 4.3.0, 4.3.1, or 4.3.2
  2. Locate the privileged helper tool binary
    Check if the file /Library/PrivilegedHelperTools/com.obdev.LittleSnitchHelper exists
    Affected if The helper tool binary is present on the system
  3. Verify helper is registered with launchd
    Check for com.obdev.LittleSnitchHelper in the output of: sudo launchctl list | grep LittleSnitch
    Affected if The helper is loaded and running as a launchd job
  4. Confirm XPC listener is active
    Examine running processes for LittleSnitchHelper XPC service: ps aux | grep -i littlesnitch
    Affected if The XPC service process is actively running

You are affected if Little Snitch version 4.3.0-4.3.2 is installed AND the privileged helper tool is present and running on the system.

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
Upgrade available Upgrade to a release after 4.3.2
Interim mitigation

Update Little Snitch to a version newer than 4.3.2, or disable/remove the privileged helper tool if not required.

Fix this in Little Snitch Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation1.0 h
  • Implementation1.0 h
  • Testing2.0 h
  • Review / QA1.0 h
5.0 hours of engineering $860
Get the upgrade done

An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $1,376.

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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-2019-13013 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