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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.
Debian LinuxOperating system · Debian

CVE-2020-11652

MEDIUM · 6.5 CVSS v3.1 Published 2020-04-30
Fix available
A fix is available. Upgrade to 2019.2.4 / 3000.2 or later.
See remediation →
100/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
In the wild High EPSS Public exploit Remotely reachable 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
An issue was discovered in SaltStack Salt before 2019.2.4 and 3000 before 3000.2. The salt-master process ClearFuncs class allows access to some methods that improperly sanitize paths. These methods allow arbitrary directory access to authenticated users.

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

The salt-master process ClearFuncs class contains methods that fail to properly sanitize directory paths, allowing authenticated users to perform path traversal and access arbitrary directories on the Salt master server.

MitigationUpgrade Salt to version 2019.2.4 or 3000.2 or later to patch the path traversal vulnerability. If immediate patching is not feasible, restrict network access to the Salt API and enforce strict authentication controls.

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
Debian LinuxOperating system
Affected:= 8.0= 9.0= 10.0
Ubuntu LinuxOperating system
Affected:= 16.04= 18.04
Application Remote CollectorApplication
Affected:= 7.5.0= 8.0.0
SaltApplication
Affected:< 2019.2.4>= 3000, < 3000.2
LeapOperating system
Affected:= 15.1
Workspaces ServerApplication
Affected:<= 7.1.3>= 8.0.0, <= 8.2.6= 9.1.0

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

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/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 if Salt master is running
    Run 'ps aux | grep salt-master' or 'systemctl status salt-master' to check if the salt-master process is active
    Affected if salt-master process is running and the installed version is vulnerable
  2. Check installed Salt version
    Run 'salt --version' or 'salt-master --version' to obtain the exact version number, then compare against affected ranges: < 2019.2.4 or >= 3000.0 but < 3000.2
    Affected if version falls within < 2019.2.4 or >= 3000.0 and < 3000.2
  3. Verify ClearFuncs exposure
    Check if the Salt API ports (4506 for publishers, 4505 for ret ports) are listening. Use 'netstat -tulpn | grep -E "450[56]"' or 'ss -tulpn | grep -E "450[56]"'
    Affected if Salt API ports are open and accessible to the network or untrusted users
  4. Confirm authentication is enabled
    Review Salt master configuration file (typically /etc/salt/master) to verify if external authentication is configured and whether guest/anonymous access could be permitted
    Affected if external auth is misconfigured or weak authentication allows unauthorized users to reach the ClearFuncs interface

A user is affected if salt-master is running with a version below 2019.2.4 or between 3000.0 and 3000.2, and the Salt API is network-accessible with authentication that could be exploited.

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 2019.2.4 / 3000.2 or later
Fixed in 2019.2.43000.2
Interim mitigation

Upgrade Salt to version 2019.2.4 or 3000.2 or later to patch the path traversal vulnerability. If immediate patching is not feasible, restrict network access to the Salt API and enforce strict authentication controls.

Recommended fix High confidence

Salt 2019.2.4+ (for 2019.2 branch) or Salt 3000.2+ (for 3000 branch), preferably latest 2019.2.8 or 3000.6 LTS

  1. 1. Identify the currently installed Salt version by running: salt --version or salt-master --version
  2. 2. For systems running Salt < 2019.2.4: Upgrade to Salt 2019.2.4 or later (recommended: 2019.2.8 which includes all 2019.2.x security fixes)
  3. 3. For systems running Salt >= 3000 but < 3000.2: Upgrade to Salt 3000.2 or later (recommended: 3000.6 or latest 3000.x LTS)
  4. 4. On Debian/Ubuntu systems, update via: apt-get update && apt-get install salt-master salt-minion
  5. 5. On RHEL/CentOS systems, update via: yum update salt-master salt-minion
  6. 6. Restart the salt-master service after upgrade: systemctl restart salt-master
  7. 7. Verify the upgrade was successful by checking: salt --version
  8. 8. Ensure authentication mechanisms are properly configured and network access to the salt-master is restricted to trusted clients only
Caveat Review Salt migration notes between major versions - potential changes in module names, state file syntax, and deprecated features; test in non-production environment first

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

Fix this in Debian Linux Exploited in the wild — priority engagement
  • Consultation3.0 h
  • Implementation2.0 h
  • Testing3.0 h
  • Review / QA2.0 h
10.0 hours of engineering $1,770
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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-2020-11652 in production — separate from our analysis above.

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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