What’s Vulnerable › Vulnerabilities
CVE-2023-3972: Insights-client: unsafe handling of temporary files and directories
- Severity: high (CVSS 7.8 v3.1)
- Exploited in the wild: not listed in CISA KEV
- EPSS: 0.3% probability of exploitation in the next 30 days
- Public exploit or detection template: none known
- Published: 2023-11-01 · updated 2026-06-17
- Weakness: CWE-379
Description
A vulnerability was found in insights-client. This security issue occurs because of insecure file operations or unsafe handling of temporary files and directories that lead to local privilege escalation. Before the insights-client has been registered on the system by root, an unprivileged local user or attacker could create the /var/tmp/insights-client directory (owning the directory with read, write, and execute permissions) on the system. After the insights-client is registered by root, an attacker could then control the directory content that insights are using by putting malicious scripts into it and executing arbitrary code as root (trivially bypassing SELinux protections because insights processes are allowed to disable SELinux system-wide).
Affected products
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux: 7.0, 8.0, 9.0
- RedHat Enterprise Linux Aus: 8.6
- RedHat Enterprise Linux Desktop: 7.0
- RedHat Enterprise Linux Eus: 8.6, 8.8, 9.0, 9.2
- RedHat Enterprise Linux For Arm 64: 8.0
- RedHat Enterprise Linux For Arm 64 Eus: 8.6, 8.8, 9.0, 9.2
- RedHat Enterprise Linux For Ibm Z Systems: 7.0, 8.0, 9.0
- RedHat Enterprise Linux For Ibm Z Systems Eus: 8.6, 8.8, 9.0, 9.2
- RedHat Enterprise Linux For Power Big Endian: 7.0
- RedHat Enterprise Linux For Power Little Endian: 7.0, 8.0, 9.0
- RedHat Enterprise Linux For Power Little Endian Eus: 8.6, 8.8, 9.2
- RedHat Enterprise Linux For Scientific Computing: 7.0
- RedHat Enterprise Linux Server: 7.0
- RedHat Enterprise Linux Server Aus: 8.2, 8.4, 9.2
- RedHat Enterprise Linux Server For Power Little Endian Update Services For Sap Solutions: 8.1, 8.2, 8.4, 8.6, 8.8, 9.0 (+1)
- RedHat Enterprise Linux Server Tus: 8.2, 8.4, 8.6, 8.8
- RedHat Enterprise Linux Server Update Services For Sap Solutions: 9.2
- RedHat Enterprise Linux Update Services For Sap Solutions: 8.1, 8.2, 8.4, 8.6, 8.8
- RedHat Insights-Client: before 3.2.2 — fixed in 3.2.2
How to fix
Upgrade to a fixed version: RedHat Insights-Client 3.2.2. Check the vendor advisory for mitigations.
References
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6264
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6282
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6283
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6284
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6795
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6796
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6798
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6811
- https://access.redhat.com/security/cve/CVE-2023-3972
- https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2227027
- https://github.com/RedHatInsights/insights-core/pull/3878
- https://access.redhat.com/errata/RHSA-2023:6264
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