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Actively exploited in the wild. This CVE is on the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities list — treat remediation as urgent. Federal remediation due by 3 May 2022.
DockerApplication

CVE-2019-15752

HIGH · 7.8 CVSS v3.1 Published 2019-08-28
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to 2.1.0.1 or later.
See remediation →
97/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
In the wild Public exploit No privileges

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
Docker Desktop Community Edition before 2.1.0.1 allows local users to gain privileges by placing a Trojan horse docker-credential-wincred.exe file in %PROGRAMDATA%\DockerDesktop\version-bin\ as a low-privilege user, and then waiting for an admin or service user to authenticate with Docker, restart Docker, or run 'docker login' to force the command.

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

Docker Desktop Community Edition before 2.1.0.1 is vulnerable to local privilege escalation via unsafe executable loading. A low-privilege user can place a malicious docker-credential-wincred.exe file in the %PROGRAMDATA%\DockerDesktop\version-bin\ directory, which gets executed with elevated privileges when an administrator authenticates with Docker, restarts Docker, or runs 'docker login'.

MitigationUpgrade Docker Desktop Community Edition to version 2.1.0.1 or later; verify the integrity of docker-credential-wincred.exe in the version-bin directory and ensure proper file permissions prevent unauthorized modification.

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
DockerApplication
Affected:< 2.1.0.1
GeodeApplication
Affected:= 1.12.0

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
None
User interaction
Required
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
High

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/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. Check Docker Desktop version
    Run 'docker --version' or check Docker Desktop's about section to find the installed version number
    Affected if Version is earlier than 2.1.0.1 (e.g., 2.1.0.0, 2.0.x, 1.x)
  2. Verify version-bin directory exists
    Check if the directory %PROGRAMDATA%\DockerDesktop\version-bin\ exists on Windows
    Affected if The directory exists and is accessible to the current user
  3. Inspect docker-credential-wincred.exe
    List files in %PROGRAMDATA%\DockerDesktop\version-bin\ and verify if docker-credential-wincred.exe is present
    Affected if The executable docker-credential-wincred.exe exists in this directory
  4. Check file permissions
    Review file permissions on docker-credential-wincred.exe in the version-bin directory to see if non-privileged users can modify or replace it
    Affected if Standard users have write or modify permissions on the executable, allowing them to replace it with a malicious file

You are affected if Docker Desktop Community Edition version is earlier than 2.1.0.1 AND the docker-credential-wincred.exe file exists in %PROGRAMDATA%\DockerDesktop\version-bin\ with weak permissions that allow modification by low-privilege users.

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.

dbcve · scoped
Upgrade available Upgrade to 2.1.0.1 or later
Fixed in 2.1.0.1
Interim mitigation

Upgrade Docker Desktop Community Edition to version 2.1.0.1 or later; verify the integrity of docker-credential-wincred.exe in the version-bin directory and ensure proper file permissions prevent unauthorized modification.

Recommended fix High confidence

Docker Desktop Community Edition 2.1.0.1 or later

  1. Open Docker Desktop
  2. Go to the Docker menu ( whale icon ) and select 'Check for Updates'
  3. If an update is available, download and install Docker Desktop version 2.1.0.1 or later
  4. Restart Docker Desktop after the update completes
  5. Alternatively, download Docker Desktop 2.1.0.1 or newer directly from the official Docker website and reinstall
Caveat Minor/patch upgrades typically have minimal breaking changes; however, ensure any custom Docker configurations are backed up before upgrading

Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.

Fix this in Docker Exploited in the wild — priority engagement
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation2.0 h
  • Testing2.0 h
  • Review / QA1.0 h
7.0 hours of engineering $1,240
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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-2019-15752 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