CVE-2025-43991
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 · uneditedSupportAssist for Home PCs versions 4.8.2 and prior and SupportAssist for Business PCs versions 4.5.3 and prior, contain an UNIX Symbolic Link (Symlink) following vulnerability. A low privileged attacker with local access to the system could potentially exploit this vulnerability to delete arbitrary files only in that affected system.
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 confidenceDell SupportAssist for Home and Business PCs contains a symlink following vulnerability where the application creates or manipulates files without properly validating symlink targets, allowing a low-privileged local attacker to delete arbitrary files on the system by creating malicious symlinks.
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< 4.5.3.25254< 4.8.2.29006CVSS 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
- None
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Confirm SupportAssist installationOpen Programs and Features (appwiz.cpl) or check Program Files folder for 'Dell SupportAssist' or 'SupportAssist' entriesAffected if Dell SupportAssist for Home or Business PCs is not found on the system, then the vulnerability does not apply
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Identify installed versionRight-click SupportAssist in the application list and select Properties, or look for a version entry in the installation details. Alternatively, check the uninstall string in Windows Registry under HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\ or HKLM\SOFTWARE\Dell\SupportAssistAffected if The version displayed cannot be determined or is not visible
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Compare version against vulnerable rangesNote the full version number found in the previous step. Compare numerically: For Business PCs, any version below 4.5.3.25254 is vulnerable. For Home PCs, any version below 4.8.2.29006 is vulnerable.Affected if The installed version is below 4.5.3.25254 (Business) or below 4.8.2.29006 (Home)
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Verify if SupportAssist service is activeOpen Services (services.msc) and look for 'SupportAssist' or 'Dell SupportAssist' service, or run 'sc query SupportAssist' from elevated command promptAffected if The service is installed but not running, the immediate exploitation risk is reduced but the vulnerable binary still exists on the system
A user is affected if Dell SupportAssist for Home PCs version below 4.8.2.29006 or for Business PCs version below 4.5.3.25254 is installed on their system.
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 data4.5.3.252544.8.2.29006
Apply vendor patches or upgrade to SupportAssist for Home PCs version 4.8.3 or later and SupportAssist for Business PCs version 4.5.4 or later. Restrict local access to minimize attack surface.
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation3.0 h
- Testing4.0 h
- Review / QA2.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2025-43991 — 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-2025-43991 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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- 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
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