ChromeWeb browser · Google
CVE-2020-6495
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 · uneditedInsufficient policy enforcement in developer tools in Google Chrome prior to 83.0.4103.97 allowed an attacker who convinced a user to install a malicious extension to potentially perform a sandbox escape via a crafted Chrome Extension.
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 confidenceInsufficient policy enforcement in Chrome's developer tools allowed a malicious Chrome extension to potentially escape the sandbox. Attackers needed to socially engineer users into installing a crafted malicious extension first, then could potentially break out of the sandbox isolation via the developer tools policy flaw.
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
ChromeWeb browser
< 83.0.4103.97
Debian LinuxOperating system
= 9.0= 10.0= sle-15= 15.1CVSS 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
- None
- User interaction
- Required
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- None
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- None
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:H/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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Check your Chrome versionNavigate to chrome://settings/help or use the Chrome menu > Help > About Google Chrome to view the installed version numberAffected if The version is lower than 83.0.4103.97
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Review installed extensionsNavigate to chrome://extensions/ and review all enabled extensions. Check for any unknown, untrusted, or recently installed extensions that were not obtained from the Chrome Web StoreAffected if There are extensions installed from unknown sources or suspicious extensions that the user did not intentionally install
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Verify Chrome extension policiesCheck if your organization has enforced policies restricting extension installation. On Windows, check Registry under HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Google\Chrome\ExtensionInstallSources or HKCU\... On Linux, check /etc/opt/chrome/policies/managed/ or /etc/chromium/policies/Affected if No organizational policies are configured to restrict extension installation to trusted sources only
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Check DevTools accessibilityOpen Chrome DevTools (F12 or Ctrl+Shift+I) and verify whether your organization has policies controlling DevTools access. Check for policies like DeveloperToolsDisabled in the same policy locationsAffected if DevTools are freely accessible with no organizational restrictions and you have untrusted extensions installed
You are affected if your Chrome version is below 83.0.4103.97 AND you have untrusted or malicious extensions installed, since the attack requires both the vulnerable version and a crafted malicious extension to exploit the policy enforcement flaw.
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 data83.0.4103.97
Update Chrome to version 83.0.4103.97 or later and enforce organizational policies that restrict extension installation to trusted sources from the Chrome Web Store only.
Fix this in Chrome
Scoped from the published advisory
- Consultation3.0 h
- Implementation6.0 h
- Testing3.0 h
- Review / QA2.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $3,984.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2020-6495 — 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-2020-6495 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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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.
- 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