CVE-2026-53872
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 · uneditedpicklescan before 0.0.35 contains an unsafe pickle deserialization vulnerability allowing unauthenticated attackers to read arbitrary server files by chaining io.FileIO and urllib.request.urlopen. Attackers can bypass RCE-focused blocklists to exfiltrate sensitive data like /etc/passwd to external servers.
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 · moderate confidencepicklescan before 0.0.35 contains an unsafe pickle deserialization vulnerability where attackers can craft malicious pickle payloads chaining io.FileIO and urllib.request.urlopen to read arbitrary server files (e.g., /etc/passwd) and exfiltrate them to external servers. The attack specifically bypasses RCE-focused blocklists by targeting file read/data exfiltration rather than code execution.
Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.
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
- None
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- None
- Availability
- None
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/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 checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Identify picklescan installation and versionRun `pip show picklescan` or check your package manager for the installed picklescan package versionAffected if The installed version is lower than 0.0.35 or cannot be determined (indicating an unpatched version)
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Verify pickle deserialization usageInspect code that invokes picklescan to see if it performs pickle.load(), pickle.loads(), or uses the picklescan library functions on untrusted inputAffected if The application deserializes pickle data from untrusted sources without sanitization, enabling the vulnerable code path
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Assess network exposure of picklescanDetermine whether picklescan processes files from untrusted or external sources, or runs in a context where attackers can supply malicious pickle filesAffected if Picklescan processes pickle files from untrusted input sources, allowing attackers to deliver crafted payloads
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Check for file access from pickle operationsReview logs, network traffic, or system monitoring for unexpected file access (e.g., /etc/passwd) or outbound network connections originating from the picklescan processAffected if Evidence exists of unauthorized file reads or outbound exfiltration attempts, indicating active exploitation
A user is affected if picklescan version is below 0.0.35 and processes pickle files from untrusted sources, allowing attackers to read server files via malicious pickle payloads.
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.
dbcve · scopedUpgrade to picklescan version 0.0.35 or later. Additionally, implement input validation and sandboxing around pickle deserialization to block file access operations and urllib calls.
picklescan 0.0.35 or later
- Check current picklescan version using pip show picklescan or poetry show picklescan
- Upgrade picklescan to version 0.0.35 or later using: pip install picklescan>=0.0.35 or poetry add picklescan@^0.0.35
- Verify the upgrade was successful by checking the installed version
Generated from the published advisory — verify against the referenced sources before acting.
- Consultation3.0 h
- Implementation4.0 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 $3,408.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2026-53872 — 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-2026-53872 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
- No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data