CVE-2020-7280: Symbolic Link vulnerability during DAT update

Severity: high (CVSS 7.8 v3.1)
Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
EPSS: 0.4% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
Public exploit or detection template: none known
Published: 2020-06-10 · updated 2026-06-17
Weakness: CWE-269

Description

Privilege Escalation vulnerability during daily DAT updates when using McAfee Virus Scan Enterprise (VSE) prior to 8.8 Patch 15 allows local users to cause the deletion and creation of files they would not normally have permission to through altering the target of symbolic links. This is timing dependent.

Affected products

Intel VirusScan Enterprise Linux (VSEL): 8.8, 8.8-patch1, 8.8-patch10, 8.8-patch11, 8.8-patch12, 8.8-patch13 (+9)

References

https://kc.mcafee.com/corporate/index?page=content&id=SB10302
https://www.zerodayinitiative.com/advisories/ZDI-20-702/
https://kc.mcafee.com/corporate/index?page=content&id=SB10302
https://www.zerodayinitiative.com/advisories/ZDI-20-702/

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